THE    LIFE 


OF 


MARIE    ANTOINETTE 


VOLUME  I. 


Marie  Antoinette. 


CcotoneD  fop  tlje  acaliemt'e  JFrancaise 


THE    LIFE 


OF 


MARIE   ANTOINETTE 

BY 

MAXIME   DE    LA    ROCHETERIE 


£ranslatca  from  ttje  jFratc!) 

BY 

CORA    HAMILTON     BELL 


IN  TWO   VOLUMES 
VOL.    I. 


NEW    YORK 
DODD,    MEAD    AND    COMPANY 

1893 


Copyright,  1893, 
BY  DODD,  MEAD  AND  COMPANY. 


All  rights  reserved. 


Stntorrattg  $rrss: 
JOHN  WILSON  AND  SON,  CAMBRIDGE,  U.S.A. 


PREFACE. 


f-JA  VING  been  commissioned  by  the  "  Revue  des  Ques- 
tions Historiques"  some  years  ago,  to  write  a  review 
of  "  The  Correspondence  of  the  Comte  de  Mercy  with  Maria 

Theresa"  which  had  then  just  appeared,  I  made  the  follow- 
ing statement :  — 

"  The  exact  historical  truth  is  to  be  found  in  these  reports 
of  Mercy,  and  is  a  mean  between  the  mass  of  partisan  as- 
sertions of  Aladame  Campan,  Weber,  and  Montjoye  on 
the  one  hand,  and  the  calumnies  and  coarse  insinuations 
of  Besenval,  Lauzun,  and  Soiilavie,  on  the  other,  —  between 
the  systematic  aspersion  of  her  enemies  and  the  almost 
superstitious  enthusiasm  of  her  friends ;  somewhere  be- 
tween the  libel  and  the  legend,  but  on  the  whole  nearer  the 
legend.  Marie  Antoinette  was  not  a  sinner,  neither  was 
she  a  saint.  She  was  a  pure  and  charming  woman, 
somewhat  heedless  and  frivolous,  but  always  chaste;  a 
(jueen  somewhat  too  hot-headed  in  the  patronage  she 
bestowed,  and  inconsiderate  in  her  political  actions,  but 
proud  and  energetic  ;  a  true  queen,  by  reason  of  the  dig- 
nity of  her  bearing  and  the  splendour  of  her  majesty ;  a 
true  woman,  in  virtue  of  the  seductiveness  of  her  manners 


vi  PREFACE 

and  the  tenderness  of  her  heart,  till  she  became  a  martyr, 
through  the  extremity  of  her  trials  and  her  triumphant 
death." 1 

Fifteen  years  of  conscientious  research,  the  examination 
of  new  and  important  documents,  —  such  as  the  "  Papers  of 
Count  Fersen"  "  The  Correspondence  of  Baron  de  Sta'el" 
that  of  Count  von  Goltz,  that  of  Mercy  with  Joseph  II. 
and  Kaunitz,  "  The  Memoirs  of  the  Duchesse  de  TourzelC 
etc.,  —  have  not  changed  my  opinion  ;  and  I  repeat  now 
what  I  wrote  in  1874. 

T/ie  same  qualities  that  mark  the  first  ten  years  of  Mane 
Antoinettes  life  in  France  are  to  be  found  during  the  last 
thirteen,  and  till  the  fatal  i6t/i  of  October,  1 793,  with  only 
such  changes  as  age,  experience,  maternity,  and,  above  all, 
misfortune,  were  bound  to  bring. 

I  have  sought  to  present  them  as  they  appeared  to  me  after 
much  study  and  comparison  of  texts,  bearing  in  mind  as  far 
as  possible  not  only  the  first,  but  the  secondary  causes  that 
produced  them. 

I  have  not  suppressed  either  mistakes  or  faults,  having  no 
other  desire  but  to  discover  the  truth,  and  no  other  ambition 
but  to  speak  it. 

Have  I  succeeded  ?     It  is  for  my  readers  to  decide. 

1  Revue  des  Questions  Historiques,  April,  1874,  p  594. 


CONTENTS. 

VOLUME    I. 


PAGE 

INTRODUCTION xiii 


CHAPTER    I. 

Birth  of  Marie  Antoinette.  —  The  Duke  von  Tarouka.  —  The  Poet 
Metastasio.  —  Education.  —  The  Countess  von  Brandeiss.  —  The 
Countess  von  Lerchenfeld.  —  Death  of  Francis  I.  ;  his  Instruc- 
tions to  his  Children.  —  The  Abbe"  de  Vermond.  —  Celebration  of 
the  Betrothal.  —  Departure  of  Marie  Antoinette.  —  The  Empress's 
Counsel  to  her  Daughter 


CHAPTER   II. 

The  Dauphiness  of  France.  —  Strasburg.  —  Nancy.  —  Rheims.  —  Com- 
piegne.  —  Portrait  of  the  Dauphiness.  —  Marie  Antoinette  at  St. 
Denys.  —  Supper  at  La  Muette  with  Madame  du  Barry.  —  Celebra- 
tion of  the  Marriage  at  Versailles.  —  The  Pretensions  of  the  Prin- 
cesses of  the  House  of  Lorraine.  —  Celebrations  in  Paris.  —  The 
Catastrophe  on  La  Place  Louis  XV.  —  Letter  from  the  Dauphin  to 
the  Lieutenant  of  the  Police 15 


CHAPTER   III. 

The  Royal  Family  in  1770.  — The  King.  —  Mesdames.  —  The  Comte  de 
Provence.  —  The  Comte  d'Artois.  —  Mesdames  Clotilde  and  Elisa- 
beth. —  The  Dauphin 29 

CHAPTER   IV. 

Intrigues  at  Court  —  Rival  Parties.  —  Espionage  of  the  Due  de  la  Vau- 
guyon.  —  The  Successful  De"but  of  the  Dauphiness.  —  The  Com- 
tesse  de  Gramont.  —  One  of  Marie  Antoinette's  Days  ;  her 
Reading.  —  Counsels  of  Maria  Theresa.  —  After  Some  Resistance 
the  Dauphiness  follows  them 38 


viii  CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  V. 

PAGE 

What  must  be  thought  of  Maria  Theresa's  Reproofs.  —  The  Counsellors 
of  Marie  Antoinette.  —  The  Comte  de  Mercy ;  his  Means  of  Infor- 
mation.—  The  Abbe"  de  Vermond  — Marie  Antoinette's  Fondness 
for  Riding. — The  Influence  of  Mesdames.  —  How  this  Influence 
was  gained.  —  The  Household  of  the  Dauphiness.  —  The  Comtesse 
de  Noailles. —  Madame  1'Etiquette. —  The  Comtesse  de  Cosse"  and 
the  Comtesse  de  Mailly.  —  The  Taking  of  the  Veil  by  Madame 
Louise.  —  The  Disadvantage  of  the  Influence  of  Mesdames  upon 
their  Niece.  —  The  Comtesse  de  Narbonne  and  the  Marquise  de 
Durfort.  — The  Relation  of  the  King  and  Marie  Antoinette.  —  Dimi- 
nution of  the  Influence  of  Mesdames.  —  The  Dissatisfaction  of 
Madame  Adelaide  ;  her  Spitefulness 48 


CHAPTER   VI. 

Disgrace  of  the  Due  de  Choiseul ;  his  Triumphant  Exile ;  his  Char- 
acter. —  Fall  of  the  Parliaments.  —  Discontent  of  the  People.  —  The 
Due  d'Aiguillon.  —  The  Comtesse  du  Barry.  —  The  Proud  Attitude 
of  the  Dauphiness  toward  the  Favourite.  —  The  King  is  displeased 
by  it.  —  Remonstrances  from  Maria  Theresa.  —  Letter  from  Kau- 
nitz  to  Mercy.  —  Direct  Intervention  of  Louis  XV.  —  Insistence  on 
the  Part  of  the  Empress.  —  Lively  Letters  exchanged  between 
Mother  and  Daughter.  —  Madame  du  Barry  seeks  to  propitiate  the 
Dauphiness;  she  fails.  —  In  this  Conflict,  History  shows  Marie 
Antoinette  to  have  been  in  the  Right 61 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Popularity  of  the  Dauphiness.  —  Traits  of  Kindness.  —  The  Peasant  of 
Acheres.  —  The  Burning  of  the  Hotel  Dieu.  —  Entrance  of  the  Dau- 
phin and  Dauphiness  into  Paris.  —  The  Universal  Enthusiasm.  — 
Letter  from  Marie  Antoinette  to  her  Mother.  —  Representations  at 
the  Come'die  Franchise  and  at  the  Come'die  Italienne. —  The  Comte 
de  Provence  and  the  Comte  d'Artois ;  their  Marriages ;  their  Re- 
lations with  the  Dauphiness.  —  The  Amusements  of  the  Young 
Couples.  —  Comedy  in  their  Private  Apartments.  —  The  Intimacy  of 
the  Dauphin  and  the  Dauphiness.  —  The  Dauphin  becomes  less 
Timid,  the  Dauphiness  more  Thoughtful.  —  The  Assured  Position 
of  Marie  Antoinette  at  the  Court  in  the  Beginning  of  May,  1774  .  76 


CHAPTER  VIII. 
Death  of  Louis  XV 91 


CONTENTS.  ix 


CHAPTER   IX. 

PAGE 

Beginning  of  the  Reign  of  Louis  XVI.  —  Difficulties  of  the  Situation.  — 
The  Hopes  of  the  Public.  —  Popularity  of  the  New  Sovereigns  — 
Maurepas  made  Minister.  —  Fall  of  the  Old  Ministers.  —  Return  of 
Choiseul.  —  The  Politic  Attitude  of  the  Queen  ;  her  Repugnance  to 
Business.  —  Maria  Theresa,  Mercy,  and  Vermond  urge  her  to  attend 
to  it.  —  Marie  Antoinette  resists  their  Advice. —  Suppers  at  the 
Court.  —  Etiquette.  —  The  Queen  emancipates  herself  from  it.  — 
The  Inconveniences  that  result  from  this  Freedom.  —  The  Inocula- 
tion of  the  King 96 

CHAPTER  X. 

The  New  Ministry.  —  Du  Muy.  —  Turgot.  — Vergennes.  —  Recall  of  the 
Parliament.  —  Marie  Antoinette,  Queen  of  Fashion  and  Taste. — 
Mademoiselle  Bertin.  —  The  Coiffure.  —  Amusements  at  Court. — 
The  Enthusiasm  of  Horace  Walpole.  —  Moderation  of  the  Queen  in 
her  Tastes;  her  Popularity.  —  Representations  of  Gluck's  "  Iphi- 
genia."  —  Goodness  of  the  Queen. —  Messieurs  d'Assas,  de  Belle- 
garde,  de  Castelnau,  de  Pontecoulant.  —  Disagreements  in  the  Royal 
Family. —  First  Calumnies. — Beaumarchais  and  the  Jew,  Ange- 
lucci.  —  Journey  of  the  Archduke  Maximilian.  —  Questions  of  Pre- 
cedence.—  Mistakes  of  the  Archduke.  —  The  Nickname  of  the 
"Austrian."  —  Marie  Antoinette  no  longer  knows  German  ...  112 


CHAPTER  XI. 

Coronation  of  the  King.  —  Celebrations  at  Rheims.  —  Emotion  of  the 
Queen  ;  her  Letter  to  the  Empress.  —  Marriage  of  Madame  Clotilde. 
—  Renewed  and  Vain  Efforts  to  recall  Choiseul.  —  Trial  of  the 
Comte  de  Guines.  —  Exile  of  the  Due  d'Aiguillon.  —  Nomination 
of  Malesherbes.  —  Reforms  of  Turgot  ;  Complaints  which  they 
Aroused.  —  Fall  of  Turgot.  —  The  Share  which  the  Queen  had  in 
it. — Letter  of  Mercy  to  Maria  Theresa 127 


CHAPTER  XII. 

Period  of  Dissipation.  —  Horse-Races.  —  Hunts  in  the  Bois  de  Bou- 
logne. —  Sleigh-Rides.  —  Visits  to  Paris.  —  Balls  at  the  Opera.  — 
The  Adventure  of  Monsieur.  —  The  Queen  in  a  Cab ;  her  Neglect  of 
Etiquette.  —  The  Unfortunate  Condescension  of  the  King.  —  Expen- 
ditures of  the  Queen  ;  her  Jewels.  —  Play.  —  The  Bankers  at  Fon- 
tainebleau.  —  Despite  Even-thing  the  Queen  remains  Faithful  to  her 
Habits  of  Piety.  —  What  Mercy  thinks  of  the  Character  and  Con- 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

duct  of  Marie  Antoinette  during  this  Period.  —  Opinion  of  the 
Prince  de  Ligne.  —  Opinion  of  the  Count  von  Goltz.  —  A  Page  from, 
the  Comte  d'Haussonville 138 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

The  Companions  of  the  Queen.  —  The  Princesse  de  Lamballe ;  her 
Appointment  as  Superintendent  of  the  Household  of  the  Queen.  — 
The  Comtesse  de  Dillon.  —  The  Princesse  de  Gue'me'ne'e.  —  The 
Comtesse  Jules  de  Polignac.  —  Favours  granted  to  the  Polignac 
Family.  —  The  Polignac  Set.  —  The  Comte  de  Vaudreuil.  —  The 
Comte  d'Adhe"mar.  — The  Baron  de  Besenval.  — The  Due  de  Guines. 

—  The  Due  de  Lauzun.  —  Foreigners.  —  La  Marck.  —  Esterhazy.  — 
Stedingk.  — Fersen.  — Rivalry  of  the  Favourites.  — Decline  in  Favour 
of  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe.  —  Increasing  Influence  of  Madame  de 
Polignac;  Disadvantages  of  this  Influence.  —  The   Queen  cannot 
resist  the  Solicitations  of  her  Friends.  —  True  Causes  of  the  Dissi- 
pation of  Marie  Antoinette 150 

CHAPTER  XIV. 

Trianon.  —  The  King  gives  the  Queen  Little  Trianon.  —  The  Chateau. 

—  The  Gardens. —  The  Exotic  Trees.  — The  River.  —  The  The- 
atre.—The  Temple  of  Love.  —  The  Belvedere.  —  The  Grotto.— 
The  Hamlet.  —  The  Dairy.  —  Travellers'  Opinions  of  Trianon.  — 
Arthur   Young.  —  The   Russian  Karamsine.  —  The  Baroness  von 
Oberkirche.  — The  Prince  de  Ligne.  — The  Apartments  :  the  Dining- 
Room  ;  the  Little  Salon  ;  the  Bath-Room ;  the  Boudoir;  the  Queen's 
Chamber.  —  Marie  Antoinette  and  the  Arts.  —  The  Marie  Antoi- 
nette Style.  —  The  Queen's  Apartments  at  Fontainebleau.  —  Life  of 
the  Queen  at  Trianon.  —  Entertainments  in  Honour  of  Illustrious 
Visitors.  —  Marie  Antoinette  and  Literature.  —  Music.  —  Gluck  and 
Piccini.  —  Gre'try.  —  Salie'ri.  —  The  Theatre.  —  The  Queen's  Com- 
pany. —  Comedy  at  Trianon.  —  The  Expenses  of  Trianon.  —  The 
Disadvantages  of  Trianon 170 

CHAPTER   XV. 

Joseph  IT. 's  Journey  to  France.  —  Character  of  the  Emperor;  his  Plan 
of  the  Journey  formed,  abandoned,  taken  up  again.  —  The  Queen's 
Joy  on  seeing  her  Brother.  —  First  Interviews.  —  Reprimands  often 
Maladroit.  — The  Emperor  and  the  Queen  at  the  Opera.  —  Visits  to 
the  Monuments  and  Principal  Institutions  of  the  City  of  Paris.  — 
Affectation  of  Simplicity. —  Enthusiasm  of  the  Public.  —  Departure 
of  the  Emperor ;  his  Opinion  of  the  Queen.  —  Advice  which  he  left 
her  in  Writing.  —  The  Queen  conforms  to  it  during  a  time,  then  falls 
again  into  Dissipation.  —  Why? 198 


CONTEXTS.  xi 


CHAPTER   XVI. 

PAGE 

The  War  of  Succession  in  Bavaria.  —  Death  of  the  Elector  —  Joseph 
II.  occupies  Lower  Bavaria ;  his  Mothers  Disapproval  of  it.  — Arma- 
ments of  Frederick  II. —  Feeling  in  France. —  Maria  Theresa 
implores  her  Daughter's  Intervention.  —  Futile  Negotiations.  — 
Declaration  of  War.  — Marie  Antoinette  demands  the  Mediation  of 
France  ;  Sudden  Cessation  of  her  Appeals.  —  Interview  with  Mau- 
repas.  —  Statement  of  the  Comte  de  la  Marck  and  of  the  Count  von 
Goltz.  —  The  True  Extent  of  the  Queen's  Intervention  in  the  Affair 
of  Bavaria.  —  The  Peace  of  Teschen 215 


CHAPTER   XVII. 

The  First  Pregnancy  of  the  Queen;  her  Happiness;  her  Plans  for  the 
Education  of  her  Child.  —  The  King's  Joy.  —  Various  Sentiments 
of  the  Royal  Family  and  of  the  Court.  —  Malicious  Remarks. — 
Dramatic  Confinement  of  the  Queen.  — The  Birth  of  Madame  Royale. 
—  Joy  of  the  Public  mingled  with  Disappointment.  —  The  Queen's 
Words  to  her  Daughter. — •  Te  Deuin  in  Notre  Dame. — An  Im- 
provement in  the  Conduct  of  the  Queen,  despite  Certain  Inevi- 
table Relapses.  —  Intimacy  of  Husband  and  Wife.  —  Marie  Antoi- 
nette's Affection  for  Madame  Elisabeth.  —  Impatience  of  Maria 
Theresa  and  the  French  People  to  have  a  Dauphin.  —  Miscarriage 
of  the  Queen.  —  Death  of  Maria  Theresa.  —  Grief  of  Marie  Antoi- 
nette. —  Second  Visit  of  Joseph  II.  to  France.  —  Birth  of  the  Dau- 
phin. —  Universal  Rejoicing 229 


CHAPTER   XVIII. 

"War  in  America.  —  Franklin's  Mission.  —  War  declared.  —  The  Queen 
favourable  to  the  Americans.  —  Protectress  of  Lafayette.  —  Her 
Anxieties  during  the  War.  —  She  is  Desirous  of  an  Honourable 
Peace.  —  The  Peace  of  1783;  its  Consequences.  —  Princely  Visit- 
ors.—  The  Princesses  of  Hesse-Darmstadt. — The  Comte  and  the 
Comtesse  du  Nord.  —  Entertainments  at  Trianon  and  Chantilly.  — 
The  King  of  Sweden.  —  Prince  Henry  of  Prussia.  —  Birth  of  the 
Due  de  Normandie.  —  Bankruptcy  of  the  Prince  de  Gue'me'nee.  — The 
Duchesse  de  Polignac  made  Governess  to  the  Children  of  France  .  250 


CHAPTER   XIX. 

The  Queen  in  Politics;  her  Natural  Distaste  for  Affairs. —  Distrust  of 
Maurepas.  —  Letter  from  the  Queen  to  Joseph  II.  —  Appointment 
of  Messieurs  de  Se'gur  and  de  Castries.  —  The  Queen's  Sympathy  for 


xii  CONTENTS. 


PAGE 

Necker ;  she  supports  him  in  the  Publication  of  his  Accounts.  — The 
Fall  of  Necker.  —  The  Death  of  Maurepas.  —  Joly  de  Fleury.  — 
D'Ormesson.  —  Calonne.  —  The  Small  Part  that  Marie  Antoinette 
took  in  the  Nomination  of  the  Latter;  her  Dislike  of  him.  —  Aus- 
trian Politics.  —  The  Election  of  Maximilian  at  Cologne. — The 
Dispute  of  Joseph  II.  with  Holland.  —  "The  Marriage  of  Figaro." 
—  The  Queen  plays  "  The  Barber  of  Seville  "  at  Trianon  .  .  .  267 


CHAPTER  XX. 
Lawsuit  of  the  Necklace 287 

CHAPTER   XXI. 

Last  Days  of  Happiness.  —  Journey  to  Cherbourg.  —  The  Court  at  Fon- 
tainebleau  in  1786.  —  The  Goodness  of  the  Queen.  —  Marie  Antoi- 
nette and  her  Children.  —  The  Sons  of  the  Marquise  de  Bombelles 
and  of  the  Marquise  de  Sabran.  —  Days  of  Sorrow.  —  Scenes  at 
Trianon  described  by  Madame  Campan.  —  Calumny.  —  Pamphlets 
and  Songs.  —  Visit  of  the  Archduke  Ferdinand,  and  of  the  Duchess 
of  Saxe-Teschen.  —  Acquisition  of  St.  Cloud.  —  "  Madame  Deficit." 
—  Calonne  and  the  Queen.  —  Representation  of  "Athalie."  —  The 
Portrait  of  the  Queen  is  not  exhibited.  —  Estrangement  from  the 
Polignacs.  —  The  Death  of  Sophie  Beatrix 320 

CHAPTER   XXII. 

The  Notables.  —  Fall  of  Calonne.  —  Brienne  ;  his  Reforms  ;  his  Unpopu- 
larity recoils  upon  the  Queen.  —  Recall  of  Necker.  —  Convocation  of 
the  States-General.  —  A  Flood  of  Brochures.  —  Deceit  of  Thiers. — 
Situation  of  Marie  Antoinette  in  1789  in  Relation  to  the  Royal  Fam- 
ily. —  The  Comte  and  Comtesse  de  Provence.  —  The  Comte  and 
Comtesse  d'Artois.  —  Madame  Elisabeth.  —  Madame.  —  The  Con- 
de's.  —  The  Due  d'Orteans 332 


LIST   OF   ILLUSTRATIONS. 

VOLUME   I. 

PAGE 

MARIE  ANTOINETTE Frontispiece 

From  an  unpublished  portrait  bequeathed  M.  H.  de  Lacombe  by  Monseigneur  Dupanloup. 

Louis  XVI 35 

MADAME  DU  BARRY 71 

Louis  XV. 99 

PRINCESSE  DE  LAMBALLE 139 

MADAME  DE  POLIGNAC 183 

MARIA  THERESA  AND  JOSEPH  II 211 

MADAME  ELIZABETH 245 

MADAME  DE  LA  MOTTE 287 

COMTE  D'ARTOIS  AND  COMTE  DE  PROVENCE 347 


INTRODUCTION. 


"  TF  ever  a  nation  were   justified   in  being  astonished  by  an 
-L       event,  it  was  by  the  alliance   between  the  king  and  the 
empress-queen,  concluded   in  1756." 

It  was  in  these  words  that  the  Due  de  Choiseul,  minister  of 
foreign  affairs,  summed  up  this  important  event  in  his  instruc- 
tions to  the  Comte  de  Choiseul  in  1759,  who  had  been  appointed 
ambassador  to  Vienna,  after  having  been  one  of  the  chief  pro- 
moters of  the  change  brought  about  in  the  policy  of  France 
during  the  eighteenth  century;  and  so  profound  was  his  convic- 
tion that  he  repeated  the  same  opinion  again  twice  in  the  same 
terms,  —  once  in  1761  to  the  Comte  du  Chatelet,  and  in  1766  to 
the  Marquis  de  Durfort. 

The  change  was,  indeed,  a  radical  one ;  and  public  astonish- 
ment must  have  been  great.  For  more  than  two  centuries  France 
had  been  accustomed  to  regard  Austria  as  her  perpetual  enemy. 
Freed  from  anxiety  on  the  score  of  England,  —  who  had  been  her 
hereditary  foe  during  the  whole  of  the  Middle  Ages,  but  who  had 
been  definitely  driven  across  the  Channel  by  the  glorious  career 
of  Jeanne  d'Arc,  and  later  by  the  capture  of  Calais  by  Francois  de 
Guise,  —  she  had  been  obliged  from  the  beginning  of  modern  times 
to  fight  not  only  for  her  power,  but  for  her  very  existence,  against 
the  double  menace  of  the  Hapsburgs,  who  in  their  two  branches, 
the  Spanish  and  Austrian,  threatened  her  on  the  north,  south, 
and  east.  To  break  this  belt,  which  was  strangling  us;  to  push 
back  to  the  natural  frontiers  the  advance  posts  which  the  king 
of  Spain  on  the  one  side,  and  the  emperor  on  the  other,  had 
gained  on  our  territory;  to  reconquer  our  liberty  of  movement, 


INTRODUCTION. 


and  to  assure  to  the  crown  of  France  "  the  superior  role  which 
belonged  to  it  by  right  of  its  antiquity,  dignity,  and  grandeur," 
—  such  was  the  object  pursued  with  patient  obstinacy  and  patri- 
otic cunning  by  all  the  princes  since  Francis  I.  and  the  great 
ministers  who  had  served  them.  For  a  time  eclipsed  rather  than 
given  up  during  the  religious  disputes  under  the  last  of  the 
Valois,  the  struggle  broke  out  again  with  renewed  energy  under 
the  Bourbons.  This  struggle  for  existence  was  the  cause  of  vari- 
ous alliances  which  must  have  been  repugnant  to  his  Most 
Christian  Majesty,  but  which  necessity  imposed  upon  him,  —  the 
alliances  with  the  Sultan,  and  with  the  Protestants  of  Germany  and 
Holland,  who,  being  hostile  to  Spain  and  Austria,  were  naturally 
useful  allies  for  us.  And  it  was  thus  under  the  protection  of 
France  that  the  grandeur  of  the  Hohenzollern,  who  from  elec- 
tors of  Brandenburg  became  kings  of  Prussia,  was  founded  and 
developed. 

But  the  situation  was  changed.  The  conquests  of  Richelieu 
and  Mazarin,  assured  by  the  treaties  of  Westphalia  and  of  the 
Pyrenees,  the  victories  of  Louis  XIV.,  and  even  his  defeats,  which 
resulted  in  the  peace  of  Utrecht,  had  transformed  the  map  of 
Europe.  The  House  of  Austria  was  forever  expelled  from  Spain, 
where  it  had  been  replaced  by  the  Bourbons ;  and  if  it  continued 
to  be  a  danger  to  us  because  of  its  possessions  in  Italy,  and,  above 
all,  because  of  its  domain  in  the  Low  Countries,  where  the  coali- 
tion had  obviously  placed  it  as  an  advance-guard  against  us,  and 
because  of  its  alliance  with  England  (who,  though  kindly  disposed 
toward  Louis  XIV.  under  the  Stuarts,  had,  with  the  accession  of 
George  III.  and  the  House  of  Hanover,  resumed  all  her  old  anti- 
French  traditions),  the  treaties  of  Vienna  and  of  Aix-la-Chapelle, 
evicting  it  from  Naples  and  Parma,  and  the  treaty  of  Belgrade, 
reducing  it  on  the  east,  had  essentially  weakened  its  prestige, 
while  increasing  that  of  Prussia. 

Was  it  wise  to  push  our  revenge  further,  to  pursue  to  extinc- 
tion our  old  adversary,  already  sufficiently  humiliated,  in  order  to 
raise  on  the  ruins  a  young,  restless,  and  warlike  power,  whose 
leader,  governed  by  his  ambitions  and  held  in  check  only  by  his 
interests,  had  from  the  start  shown  himself  a  fractious  and  dis- 
loyal ally?  Was  it  necessary,  out  of  pretended  respect  for  tradi- 


INTRODUCTION.  xv 


tional  policy,  but  in  reality  from  mere  routine,  to  persist  in  a 
system  whose  good  effects  had  already  been  enjoyed ;  or  would 
it  not  be  better,  by  ending  a  struggle  which  for  the  future  would 
be  without  object,  to  guarantee  the  results  already  acquired,  and 
assure  the  equilibrium  obtained? 

For  some  time  observant  persons  might  have  noted  a  decrease 
in  the  feud  between  the  Houses  of  France  and  Austria.  The 
Emperor  Charles  VI.,  cured  of  his  ideas  of  conquest,  and  enlight 
ened  by  his  last  defeats,  had"  been  contemplating  a  reconciliation 
with  France ;  and  Cardinal  Fleury  was  by  no  means  disposed  to 
reject  his  overtures.  "  He  thought,"  as  some  one  has  justly 
remarked,  "  that  France  and  Austria  having  both  reached  their 
full  development,  it  would  be  wiser  to  seek  to  assure  their  power 
than  to  extend  it;  and  that  by  uniting  they  could  exercise  a 
pacific  influence  over  the  rest  of  Europe."  The  indorsement  by 
Versailles  of  the  Pragmatic  Sanction,  which  assured  the  succes- 
sion of  the  Hapsburgs,  seemed  the  consecration  of  this  policy  of 
peace  ;  and  even  the  treaty  of  Belgrade,  wherein  French  influence, 
exerted  for  the  benefit  of  Turkey,  checkmated  the  projects  of 
the  emperor,  did  not  alter  the  aspect  of  affairs.  An  active  cor- 
respondence was  established  between  Charles  VI.  and  Fleury; 
and  if  we  may  believe  the  testimony  of  an  unprejudiced  witness, 
Frederick  II.,  these  intimate  relations  were  on  the  point  of  result- 
ing in  the  peaceful  surrender  of  the  grand  duchy  of  Luxembourg 
to  the  king.  It  is  asserted  that  before  dying  the  emperor  recom- 
mended his  daughter  to  ally  herself  with  France. 

As  for  Louis  XVI.,  his  naturally  keen  intelligence  often  com- 
prehended the  part  it  would  be  wise  for  him  to  play,  though  his 
lack  of  energy  often  made  him  fail  to  undertake  it;  and  in  this 
instance  he  shared  the  views  of  his  minister,  and  leaned  visibly 
toward  an  understanding  with  the  court  of  Vienna.  We  read  in 
the  instructions  given  to  the  Comte  d'Estrees  "  that  the  king 
had  for  a  long  time  chafed  at  the  prejudices  against  the  establish- 
ment of  a  policy  which  would  satisfy  his  heart,  and  which  seemed 
to  him  more  fitting  than  another  for  the  maintenance  of  the  only 
true  religion  and  the  general  peace,  and  for  the  curbing  of  the 
ambition  of  each  prince  within  the  limit  and  power  of  his  par- 
ticular estate." 


xviii  INTRODUCTION. 


Theresa,  being  desirous  above  all  things  that  these  negotiations 
should  prove  successful,  and  knowing  the  preponderating  influence 
of  the  favourite,  had  not  hesitated  to  write  her  a  letter  wherein 
she  had  carried  her  condescension  to  the  point  of  addressing  her 
as  "dear  friend."  This  is  but  tradition;  and  Maria  Theresa  her- 
self took  pains  to  deny  it  in  a  letter  to  the  wife  of  the  elector  of 
Saxony.  But  what  the  empress  had  not  done,  the  ambassador 
did  not  hesitate  to  do ;  and  it  was  through  the  intervention  of 
Madame  de  Pompadour  that  he  presented  the  propositions. 
He  had  asked  that  the  king  appoint  one  of  his  ministers  to  be 
present  at  this  first  conference,  who  should  afterward  serve  as 
intermediary.  The  king  named  the  Abbe  de  Bernis;  and 
although  the  favourite  declared  that  this  choice  was  spontaneous, 
it  is  difficult  to  believe  that  she  did  not  at  least  suggest  the  name 
of  this  man,  who  was  not  a  member  of  the  Council,  but  who,  she 
knew,  was  wholly  devoted  to  her.  This  appointment  also  served 
to  conceal  from  the  ministers,  whose  prejudices  against  Austria 
were  well  known,  a  proposition  which  appealed  to  the  secret  desire 
of  the  king. 

After  some  objections  Bernis  accepted  the  mission  confided  to 
him ;  and  his  interviews  with  the  Austrian  ambassador  began  on 
the  following  day.  They  took  place  in  a  little  house  situated  below 
the  Terrace  of  Bellevue,  the  name  of  which,  Babiole,  served  as 
a  subject  of  pleasantry  to  the  friends  of  Frederick  II.  Madame 
de  Pompadour  was  present  at  the  first;  the  others  took  place 
between  Bernis  and  Stahremberg  alone.  There  was  not  even  a 
secretary  to  do  the  writing.  "  The  intention  of  the  empress  was 
to  negotiate,  as  it  were,  tcte-a-t*tc  with  the  king."  Maria  Theresa, 
Joseph  II.,  and  Kaunitz,  at  Vienna,  and  at  Versailles  the  king 
and  Madame  de  Pompadour,  were  alone  in  the  secret.  It  was 
not  until  after  nearly  three  months  that  the  French  ministers,  or 
at  least  some  of  them,  were  initiated.  As  to  the  foreign  ministers, 
"  the  secret  was  so  well  guarded,"  writes  Bernis,  "  that  during 
more  than  six  months  they  did  not  even  suspect  the  understand- 
ing existing  between  us."  Every  evening  Bernis  submitted  to  the 
king  the  results  of  the  day,  and  had  him  approve  all  the  answers 
and  memoirs  which  he  transmitted  to  Stahremberg. 

Despite  his  sovereign's  passionate  desire  to  reach  a  conclusion, 


INTRODUCTION.  xix 


the  French  negotiator  proceeded  with  the  greatest  precaution  ;  he 
was  always  afraid  of  a  snare.  The  very  frankness  and  abandon 
with  which  the  imperial  government  set  forth  its  projects  and 
disclosed  its  views  put  him  on  guard  against  their  sincerity. 
The  propositions  of  Maria  Theresa  offered  real  advantages  for 
France,  the  House  of  Bourbon,  and  the  peace  of  Europe;  but 
they  necessitated  such  a  radical  change  of  policy  that  Bernis 
hesitated  to  agree  to  them.  The  king  would  have  accepted  them 
more  quickly ;  but  he  respected  the  motives  of  his  plenipoten- 
tiary, and  left  him  free  to  act.  The  response  to  the  first  overtures 
of  Stahremberg  was  reserved,  almost  cold ;  they  intrenched 
themselves  behind  the  stipulations  of  Aix-la-Chapelle,  and 
the  negotiations  were  dragging  along,  when  an  unexpected 
discovery  came  to  change  the  face  of  things,  and  hasten  the 
conclusion. 

On  the  first  day,  — and  it  was  one  of  the  chief  facts  on  which 
he  based  his  argument,  —  the  ambassador  had  averred  that  since 
the  month  of  August  the  king  of  Prussia  had  been  negotiating  a 
treaty  with  England  by  means  of  the  intervention  of  the  Duke  of 
Brunswick.  But  how  could  one  believe  in  this  defection?  Our 
diplomats  knew  nothing  of  it.  Was  not  this  a  trap  which  was 
baited  by  the  excitement  of  our  legitimate  anger?  The  king  of 
Prussia  had  been  bound  to  us  for  fourteen  years  by  a  treaty 
which  had  still  some  months  to  run.  How  could  one  suppose 
that  at  the  moment  of  renewing  it  (for  nothing  had  shown  any 
inclination  on  his  part  to  break  it)  he  would  ally  himself  with 
England,  at  that  time  the  faithful  friend  of  Austria,  and  our  tradi- 
tional enemy,  —  particularly  at  a  moment  when  a  fresh  conflict 
had  just  broken  out  between  the  two  ancient  rivals?  On  the  8th 
of  June,  1755,  in  fact,  in  the  midst  of  peace  and  without  any 
declaration  of  hostility,  the  English  fleet  had  seized  two  French 
ships,  the  "  Alcide  "  and  the  "  Lys."  The  insult  had  been  keenly 
resented  in  France,  and  the  Prussian  minister  in  Paris,  the  Baron 
von  Knyphausen,  outdoing  the  French  in  his  indignation,  went 
about  repeating  that  such  an  aggression  was  intolerable,  and  that 
it  should  be  punished  without  delay,  by  attacking  both  England 
and  her  ally,  Austria,  even  offering  the  assistance  of  his  master, 
who  was  ready  to  enter  Bohemia  with  forty  thousand  men.  The 


XX  INTRODUCTION. 


Cabinet,  not  being  ready,  resisted  these  instigations,  and  con- 
tented itself  with  sending  a  remonstrance  to  the  Cabinet  of 
London,  abstained  from  all  reprisals,  but  none  the  less  continued 
its  preparations  for  war,  which  every  day  seemed  more  inevitable. 
How  could  one  believe  that  Frederick  would  choose  precisely 
this  moment  to  abandon  his  faithful  ally,  who  had  just  been 
brutally  insulted,  and  draw  near  to  the  aggressor  against  whom 
he  was  manifesting  his  disapproval  so  noisily? 

However  strange  and  improbable  Stahremberg's  revelation 
seemed,  it  was  necessary  to  investigate  it.  An  ambassador  extra- 
ordinary, the  Due  de  Nivernais,  was  sent  to  Berlin  under  pretext 
of  examining  with  the  king  of  Prussia  the  manner  of  renewing 
the  treaty  of  1741,  in  reality  to  discover  his  true  sentiments,  and  in 
a  way  to  feel  his  pulse  in  this  serious  juncture.  Grand  seigneur 
in  every  sense  of  the  term,  but  liberal,  a  man  of  the  world  and  of 
the  best  society,  with  an  open  and  enlightened  mind,  a  poet  at 
times,  and  a  member  of  the  French  Academy,  a  partisan  of 
Prussia,  like  most  of  the  courtiers  of  that  period,  —  the  Due  de 
Nivernais  could  not  but  be  persona  grata  at  Berlin.  The  king 
received  him  well,  welcomed  him  both  as  plenipotentiary  and  as 
academician,  heard  his  views,  listened  to  his  propositions,  over- 
whelmed him  with  civilities,  protested  his  attachment  to  France, 
strengthened  his  confidence,  hoodwinked  his  perspicacity,  and 
one  fine  day  announced  to  him  cynically  that  his  minister  to 
London  had  just  signed  a  treaty  of  alliance  with  England.  Despite 
the  efforts  which  the  duke  made  to  persuade  him  not  to  ratify 
an  act  which  at  that  moment  was  a  veritable  betrayal  of  us,  he 
confirmed  it  in  a  way,  under  his  eyes,  on  Feb.  16,  1756,  offering 
as  compensation  to  sign  one  with  us,  which,  as  Bernis  remarked, 
seemed  like  derision ;  and  to  all  the  remonstrances  of  the  pleni- 
potentiary he  only  replied  by  pleasantry.  "  You  are  very  angry," 
he  said,  laughing;  "why  don't  you  make  a  treaty  with  the 
empress?  I  should  not  mind." 

During  this  time  the  conferences  of  Bellevue,  embarrassed  by 
the  first  reply  of  Bernis,  progressed  but  slowly.  There  was  no 
question,  moreover,  of  anything  between  France  and  Austria  but 
a  simple  guarantee  treaty,  in  which  the  French  negotiator  insisted 
upon  having  the  Prussian  king  included.  The  news  of  Frederick's 


INTRODUCTION.  xxi 


treachery  precipitated  matters.  "  France  could  not  remain  with- 
out alliances  ;  and,  abandoned  by  Prussia,  she  was  obliged  to  ally 
herself  with  the  court  of  Vienna,  or  remain  exposed  to  the  league 
of  the  great  powers  of  Europe."  The  negotiations,  for  a  time 
interrupted  by  the  illness  of  Bernis,  resulted  at  last,  on  May  i, 
1756,  in  an  alliance  defensive  and  neutral. 

This  step  gave  rise  to  much  controversy  and  severe  criticism, 
both  on  its  conclusion  and  later.  The  authors  of  memoirs,  who 
were  devoted  to  the  king  of  Prussia,  the  philosophers  who  were 
subsidized  by  him,  the  diplomats  of  the  old  school,  whose  ideas 
were  thereby  deranged,  were  not  long  in  attacking  this  profound 
change  in  the  policy  of  France.  Frederick  himself,  in  his 
"  Writings,"  posed  as  a  victim.  History,  better  understood,  has 
shown  the  true  value  of  the  recriminations  of  this  strange  cham- 
pion of  liberty  and  the  rights  of  man.  It  has  been  clearly  proved 
that  it  was  he  who  first  betrayed  the  alliance  with  France,  and 
that  the  treaty  of  Versailles  was  but  the  perfectly  legitimate 
response  to  the  treaty  of  London.  As  for  the  consequences  of 
this  act,  if  they  have  not  always  been  such  as  were  prophesied 
and  hoped  for;  if  they  have  sometimes  turned  to  the  detriment 
of  France  and  to  the  advantage  of  Austria ;  if  they  resulted  in  the 
disasters  of  the  Seven  Years'  War,  and  the  partition  of  Poland, — 
it  was  not  the  fault  of  the  negotiators  of  the  treaty  of  1756,  but 
of  those  who  continued  their  work,  and  who  did  not  know  how 
to  reap  the  natural  and  just  fruit  of  it.  As  Bernis  himself  has 
rightly  observed,  "  The  failure  was  due  to  our  bad  conduct,  to 
the  poor  use  we  made  of  our  forces,  and  to  the  intrigues  which 
governed  the  choice  of  our  leaders." 

But  at  the  time  when  this  treaty  was  concluded,  it  solved  in  the 
most  satisfactory  way  a  difficult  and  delicate  situation.  When  a 
new  war  broke  out  with  England,  it  deprived  her  of  her  most 
powerful  auxiliary.  It  sustained  the  treaty  of  Westphalia,  —  the 
foundation  of  our  influence  in  Germany.  It  did  not  drag  us  into 
the  differences  between  Austria  and  Prussia,  since,  out  of  con- 
sideration for  his  former  protege,  Louis  XV.  had  expressly 
stipulated  that  no  steps  should  be  taken  against  the  king  of 
Prussia  unless  he  violated  the  conditions  of  Aix-la-Chapelle.  In 
thus  destroying,  or  at  least  greatly  diminishing,  the  chances  of 


xxii  INTRODUCTION. 


a  continental  war,  in  securing  our  frontier  to  the  north,  and  in 
uniting  the  two  great  powers,  it  gave  us  an  opportunity  to  recon- 
struct our  naval  forces,  and  to  give  ourselves  up  entirely  to  the 
maritime  struggle  with  our  ancient  rival.  It  even  enabled  us  to 
establish  peace  more  promptly  and  on  a  better  foundation. 
"  And  thus,"  Bernis  writes,  "  the  king  ought  to  have  played  the 
most  important  political  and  military  role  in  Europe  without 
infringing  upon  right  or  justice."  In  the  place  of  the  doubtful 
friendship  of  the  king  of  Prussia, —  a  factious  and  distrustful  ally, 
strong  indeed  in  the  resources  of  his  genius,  but  always  ready  to 
change  sides  in  the  interest  of  his  ambition,  —  we  substituted  an 
alliance  with  a  power  of  the  first  order,  which,  having  resigned  its 
pretensions  to  universal  dominion,  and  retired  within  its  proper 
limits,  was  no  longer  a  danger,  but  a  support.  It  was  an  act  of 
wisdom,  and,  under  the  circumstances,  an  act  of  necessity.  To 
speak  truly,  it  was  less  the  abandonment  of  the  policy  of 
Richelieu  and  of  Louis  XIV.  than  its  fulfilment  and  consecration. 
"  The  greatest  homage  which  Louis  XV.  could  pay  his  predeces- 
sors," an  eminent  statesman  has  written,  "  was  to  recognize,  as 
history  should  do  to-day,  that  since  they  had  pushed  the  claims 
of  France  against  Austria  to  the  uttermost,  it  was  neither  neces- 
sary nor  prudent  to  push  them  further." 

And  as  if  to  cement  this  new  policy,  while  the  negotiations  were 
pending  in  France  which  resulted  in  the  treaty  of  Versailles,  the 
empress  in  Austria  gave  birth  to  the  child  who  was  one  day  to 
become  the  dearest  bond  of  union  and  the  living  symbol  of  the 
alliance  between  the  two  countries. 


LIFE   OF  MARIE  ANTOINETTE. 


CHAPTER   I. 

BIRTH  OF  MARIE  ANTOINETTE.  —  THE  DUKE  VON  TAROUKA.  —  THE  POET 
METASTASIO.  —  EDUCATION.  —  THE  COUNTESS  VON  BRANDEISS.  — 
THE  COUNTESS  VON  LERCHENFELD.  —  DEATH  OF  FRANCIS  I.;  HIS 
INSTRUCTIONS  TO  HIS  CHILDREN.  —  THE  ABBE  DE  VERMOND.  — 
CELEBRATION  OF  THE  BETROTHAL.  —  DEPARTURE  OF  MARIE  AN- 
TOINETTE.—  THE  EMPRESS'S  COUNSEL  TO  HER  DAUGHTER. 

MARIE   ANTOINETTE   JEANNE    DE    LORRAINE   of 
Austria  was  born  in  Vienna  on  November  2,  All  Saints' 

Day,  I/55- 

On  the  same  day,  as  if  misfortune  wished  from  the  first  to  put 
an  indelible  stamp  upon  the  life  which  seemed  to  promise  so  bril- 
liantly and  yet  was  destined  to  know  so  many  reverses,  a  frightful 
earthquake  visited  central  Europe,  destroying  Lisbon,  chasing 
the  future  godfather  and  godmother  of  the  child  from  their  crum- 
bling palace,  burying  beneath  the  ruins  thirty  thousand  men,  and 
engulfing  on  the  strand  at  Cadiz  the  heir  to  one  of  the  most 
glorious  names  in  French  literature,  —  the  grandson  of  the  great 
Racine. 

The  young  archduchess  was  the  sixth  daughter  and  ninth  child 
of  Francis  of  Lorraine,  Emperor  of  Germany,  and  of  the  illus- 
trious Maria  Theresa.  A  story  is  told  that  one  evening  in  the 
early  autumn  of  1755,  when  the  empress  was  receiving  at  Schoen- 
brunn,  she  laughingly  asked  the  Duke  vonTarouka,  "  Shall  I  have 
a  boy  or  a  girl?  "  "  A  prince,  without  doubt,  Madame,"  replied 
the  courtier.  "  Well,"  Maria  Theresa  answered,  "  I  wager  two 
ducats  that  I  shall  give  birth  to  a  girl."  Some  time  after,  the 
child  was  born.  The  Duke  von  Tarouka  lost;  he  sent  the 
amount  of  the  bet  to  the  empress  enclosed  in  this  ingenious 
quatrain  of  the  poet  Metastasio:  — 
VOL.  i. — i 


LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 


"Ho  perduto :  1'augusta  figlia 
A  pagar  m'  ha,  condamnato. 
Ma  s'e  vero  ch'a  voi  simiglia 
Tutto  F  mundo  ha  guadagnato." 

("  I  have  lost :  the  august  girl  has  condemned  rne  to  pay.  But 
if  it  be  true  that  she  resembles  you,  then  all  the  world  has 
gained.") 

On  November  3,  the  young  princess  was  baptized  by  the  arch- 
bishop of  Vienna.  Her  godfather  and  godmother  were  the  king 
and  queen  of  Portugal,  represented  by  the  Archduke  Joseph 
and  the  Archduchess  Marie  Anne.  A  solemn  Te  Deum  was 
then  sung;  during  two  days  the  court  was  in  full  dress,  and  dur- 
ing one  in  semi-full  dress;  but  the  emperor  —  was  it  owing  to 
some  vague  presentiment  of  the  future?  —  could  not  bring  him- 
self to  give  a  great  public  banquet.  Instead  of  this,  there  were 
t\vo  days  of  rejoicing,  the  5th  and  6th  of  November,  with  public 
shows  and  free  passage  through  the  gates  of  the  city.  The  em- 
press, who  was  seriously  indisposed  after  her  confinement,  did 
not  celebrate  her  recovery  in  the  court  chapel  until  the  I4th  of 
December. 

From  the  hands  of  her  nurse,  Marie  Constance  Hoffman,  wife 
of  a  councillor  of  the  magistracy,  Jean  Georges  Weber,  the  young 
archduchess  presently  passed  into  those  of  her  governess,  the 
Countess  von  Brandeiss.  Life  at  Vienna  was  simple.  "  The 
imperial  family,"  said  Goethe,  "  is  nothing  more  than  a  large 
German  bourgeoisie."  Etiquette  was  unknown.  The  emperor 
and  empress  liked  to  live  in  the  midst  of  their  subjects,  kind 
and  friendly  toward  all,  but  restraining  familiarity  by  respect. 
Unfortunately  they  were  so  absorbed  by  the  care  of  the  policy 
and  administration  of  their  vast  empire  that  they  had  little  leisure 
to  superintend  the  education  of  their  numerous  children.  They 
confided  them  to  tutors  and  governesses  whom  they  chose  with 
care,  and  to  whom  it  appears  they  gave  their  instructions,  with- 
out, however,  seeing  that  they  were  carried  out. 

With  her  ardent  and  pleasure-loving  disposition,  her  affection- 
ate and  sensitive  heart,  her  mind,  which  was  quick  and  subtle  but 
difficult  to  hold,  her  obstinacy  in  having  her  own  way,  and  her 
cleverness  in  eluding  remonstrances,  her  taste  for  satire,  in  which 
she  was  encouraged  by  her  sister  Caroline,  with  whom  she  was 
educated  till  1767,  her  fondness  for  amusements  rather  than 
serious  studies,  —  Marie  Antoinette  did  not  find  in  her  governess 


EDUCATION. 


that  grave  and  unwavering  firmness  which  should  have  checked 
her  frivolity  and  conquered  her  wilfulness.  The  Countess  von 
Brandeiss  loved  her  pupil  very  dearly,  and  her  affection  was 
warmly  reciprocated  by  the  charge  whom  she  spoiled.  If,  per- 
chance, she  tried  to  be  severe,  and  reprimand  her,  a  childish 
outbreak,  a  witticism,  or  a  caress  would  easily  overcome  her 
momentary  displeasure.  Until  her  pupil  attained  the  age  of 
twelve,  she  was  too  little  solicitous  to  inculcate  that  concentration 
of  mind,  regularity  of  work,  and  self-control  without  which  even 
the  most  brilliant  talents  remain  sterile;  thus  education  failed 
to  fecundate  a  mind  which  Nature  had  so  richly  dowered. 

The  Countess  von  Lerchenfeld,  who  succeeded  the  Countess 
von  Brandeiss  in  1768,  had  greater  strength  of  mind  and  more 
firmness  of  character ;  but  being  possessed  of  an  unequal  temper 
and  delicate  health,  she  could  obviously  have  but  little  sympathy 
with  the  lively  and  ardent  child  under  her  care.  Marie  Antoinette 
grew  up  to  be  independent  and  gay,  witty  and  charming,  fasci- 
nating all  who  came  near  her  by  I  know  not  what  mixture  of 
French  petulance  and  German  simplicity,  but  possessed  rather 
of  natural  talents  than  acquired  accomplishments.  Messmer,  the 
director  of  the  Viennese  schools,  taught  her  to  write;  Metas- 
tasio  taught  her  Italian ;  Aufresne  and  Sainville,  French  pronun- 
ciation and  declamation;  Noverre,  dancing;  still  others,  music 
and  drawing;  but  Maria  Theresa  complained  that  she  did  not 
profit  sufficiently  from  these  lessons. 

Although  the  young  princess  manifested  great  taste  for  music, 
a  taste  which  continued  during  her  whole  life,  and  studied  Latin 
without  repugnance  and  Italian  with  pleasure ;  though  she  took 
an  interest  in  history,  provided  that  it  was  presented  to  her  as  an 
amusement  and  not  as  work,  —  she  did  not  make  equal  progress 
in  her  other  studies.  Her  handwriting  was  poor,  and  was  not 
perfected  until  after  she  went  to  France.  Her  drawings  fre- 
quently had  to  be  retouched  ;  and  she  took  certain  liberties  with 
orthography,  which,  however,  it  is  but  fair  to  say,  was  a  failing 
she  shared  in  common  with  a  great  number  of  the  distinguished 
women  of  her  time. 

On  the  other  hand,  her  judgment  was  good,  her  good-nature 
delightful,  her  sensibility  always  ready  to  do  a  kindness.  One  day 
when  the  empress  was  ill,  some  Hungarian  officers  were  waiting 
in  the  antechamber  for  an  opportunity  to  present  a  petition  to  her. 
Marie  Antoinette  saw  them  on  her  way  to  her  mother's  room. 


LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 


"  Mamma,"  she  said,  "  some  of  your  friends  are  anxious  about 
your  health,  and  wish  to  see  you."  "  Eh,  who  are  these  friends  ?  " 
"  Some  Hungarians."  The  chivalrous  devotion  of  the  Hungari- 
ans for  their  king,  Maria  Theresa,  was  well  known.  The  empress 
understood  what  the  archduchess  had  thus  delicately  insinuated, 
and  the  demand  of  the  petitioners  was  granted. 

Another  time,  the  winter  having  been  excessively  severe  in 
Vienna,  and  all  work  consequently  suspended,  the  suffering 
among  the,working  classes  was  very  great.  As  they  were  dis- 
cussing it  one  evening  at  the  palace  in  the  family  drawing-room, 
Marie  Antoinette  approached  her  mother,  and  gave  her  a  small 
box.  "There  are  fifty-five  ducats,"  she  said;  "'tis  all  I  have. 
Will  you  allow  them  to  be  distributed  among  the  unfortunate 
sufferers?  " 

Maria  Theresa  took  them,  and  adding  a  larger  sum  to  her 
daughter's  savings,  allowed  the  charitably  minded  girl  to  distribute 
the  whole  herself. 

With  this  charming  disposition  of  heart  and  mind,  a  bewitching 
spontaneity,  which  gave  evidence  of  her  delicate  sensibility,  with 
a  childish  expansiveness,  which  in  no  wise  understood  the  for- 
malities of  etiquette,  and  a  nai've  sincerity,  which  the  poisonous 
air  of  courts  had  not  stifled,  —  Marie  Antoinette,  or  rather  Ma- 
dame Antoine,  as  she  was  called  at  the  palace  of  Schoenbrunn, 
exercised  over  all  who  saw  her  an  almost  irresistible  fascination. 
When,  in  1766,  Madame  Geoffrin  passed  through  Austria  on  her 
way  to  visit  the  king  of  Poland  at  Varsovie,  —  him  whom  she  called 
her  "Dear  Son,"  —  she  stopped  at  Vienna,  and  was  there  very  gra- 
ciously received.  Maria  Theresa  was  desirous  of  presenting  to  her 
her  daughters,  particularly  her  youngest.  Madame  Geoffrin  was 
captivated.  "There  is  a  child  whom  I  should  like  to  carry  off 
with  me  !  "  she  cried.  "  Take  her ;  take  her  !  "  the  empress  re- 
plied gayly ;  and  she  recommended  her  visitor  to  write  to  France 
that  she  had  seen  the  little  one,  and  had  found  her  beautiful. 
Madame  Geoffrin  was  careful  to  do  so :  she  described  her  sojourn 
in  Vienna  to  her  friend,  Bautin  the  financier;  and  the  salons  of 
Paris  began  to  talk  of  the  beauty  and  grace  of  her  who  was  soon 
to  become  the  dauphiness  of  France. 

Sometimes,  however,  in  the  midst  of  her  demonstrations  of 
affection  and  her  dreams  of  a  glorious  future  for  her  daughter, 
the  empress  felt  herself  overcome  .by  a  gloomy  presentiment; 
she  would  then  draw  the  girl  to  her,  and  press  her  to  her  heart, 


FRANCIS'S    INSTRUCTIONS    TO    HIS    CHILDREN.  5 

and  say  to  her  in  a  voice  full  of  emotion,  "  My  daughter,  in  the 
time  of  misfortune  think  of  me." 

During  her  long  life,  so  checkered  and  so  glorious,  Maria 
Theresa  had  many  a  time  experienced  the  rude  blows  of  grief; 
and  the  gay  and  light-hearted  child,  whose  fair  hair  she  kissed, 
was  also  to  know  to  an  uncommon  degree  the  sorrows  that  may 
rend  the  heart  of  a  queen.  She  had  experienced  a  glimpse  of 
them  while  still  quite  young:  Marie  Antoinette  was  but  ten 
years  old  when  her  father  set  out  for  Innspruck,  to  be  present  at 
the  marriage  of  his  second  son  Leopold,  grand-duke  of  Tuscany. 
Before  his  departure  he  called  for  his  daughter,  "  took  her  on  his 
knee  and  kissed  her  again  and  again  with  tears  in  his  eyes,  seem- 
ing very  loath  to  leave  her;  "  "  I  longed  to  kiss  that  child,"  he 
remarked.  A  few  days  after,  on  the  i8th  of  August,  1765,  Fran- 
cis of  Lorraine  had  a  stroke  of  apoplexy,  while  sitting  at  table 
during  the  wedding  feast. 

In  dying  he  left  to  his  children,  under  the  title,  "  Instructions  to 
my  Children  both  for  their  Spiritual  and  Temporal  Lives,"  some 
admirable  counsel,  bearing  the  stamp  of  lofty  wisdom  and  true 
Christian  spirit;  but  in  which,  faithful  perhaps  to  the  patriarchal 
customs  of  the  House  of  Austria,  he  spoke  as  an  individual  rather 
than  as  a  sovereign,  as  head  of  the  family  rather  than  as  head  of 
the  empire.  "  'T  is  to  prove  to  you  after  my  death  that  I  loved 
you  during  my  lifetime  that  I  leave  to  you  these  instructions,  as 
rules  by  which  you  may  regulate  your  conduct,  and  as  precepts 
from  which  I  have  ever  derived  benefit." 

He  exhorted  them  above  all  to  remain  sincere  upholders  of  the 
Catholic  faith  and  believers  in  God,  "  who  alone  can  give  us  not 
only  our  eternal  heritage,  which  is  our  real  happiness,  but  our 
only  true  satisfaction  in  this  world.  ...  It  is  an  essential  point, 
and  one  which  I  know  not  how  to  impress  upon  you  strongly 
enough,  never  under  any  circumstances  whatsoever  to  deceive 
yourselves  about  what  is  wrong,  or  try  to  think  it  innocent.  .  .  . 
The  world  where  you  must  pass  your  life  is  but  transitory;  there 
is  nought  save  eternity  that  is  without  end.  Let  this  reflection 
prevent  your  fixing  your  affections  upon  anything  here  too 
strongly;  but  as  God  himself  has  sanctioned  amusements,  and 
that  we  should  take  delight  in  all  that  his  bounty  has  so  lavishly 
provided  for  the  gratification  of  our  senses,  it  is  right  for  us  to 
enjoy  them  according  to  his  permission.  .  .  .  We  should  enjoy 
the  pleasures  of  this  life  innocently;  for  so  soon  as  they  lead  us 


LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 


into  evil,  of  whatever  sort  it  may  be,  they  cease  to  be  pleasures, 
and  become  a  source  of  remorse  and  chagrin.  .  .  .  We  are  not 
put  into  this  world  for  our  pleasure  only,  and  God  has  granted  all 
these  diversions  but  as  a  relaxation  for  the  spirit.  .  .  .  When  it 
is  necessary  to  command,  do  not  do  so  without  previous  consider- 
ation of  what  you  command,  and  the  reasons  for  and  against, 
and  then  give  the  order  gently.  .  .  .  Have  no  particular  affection 
for  any  one  thing,  —  above  all,  no  passion,  to  which  you  should 
never  abandon  yourselves,  for  they  all  lead  to  unhappiness." 

Then,  after  recommending  to  his  children  "  reserve  and  discre- 
tion, very  necessary  qualities,"  -  —  for  "  there  is  no  use  in  saying  all 
that  one  thinks,"  —  and  charity  toward  the  poor,  "  which  is  a  good 
deed  in  the  sight  of  God,  and  makes  one  beloved  in  this  world," 
he  adds, — 

"  The  chief  care  of  a  sovereign  should  be  not  to  burden  his  subjects 
in  order  to  sustain  a  luxury  which  is  not  needful  to  the  support  and  tran- 
quillity of  these  same  subjects,  nor  to  the  preservation  and  good  of  the 
State.  .  .  . 

"  But  I  do  not  mean  to  say  by  that,  that  we  should  not  live  conformably 
to  the  state  to  which  God  has  called  us,  and  in  which  he  wishes  us  to  live 
according  to  his  laws  ;  but  the  two  are  easily  reconciled.  .  .  . 

"  Another  thing  which  I  believe  necessary  that  I  should  recommend  to 
you  is  that  you  should  never  be  idle.  The  company  which  you  keep  is 
also  a  very  delicate  matter ;  for  often  our  companions  lead  us  into  many 
things  into  which  we  cannot  fall  as  they.  Every  one  should  be  on  one's 
guard  in  this  respect ;  above  all,  persons  like  you,  my  children,  should  be 
careful,  who  are  often  surrounded  by  a  crowd  of  people  who  seek  but  to 
flatter  your  inclinations,  and  lead  them  whither  they  think  they  tend,  in 
order  thus  to  pay  court  and  win  credit  and  favour  without  considering 
either  your  good  or  that  of  the  world  ;  't  is  sufficient  for  them  if  they  gaiu 
either  favour  or  money. 

"  Friendship  is  a  sweetener  of  life ;  it  is  only  necessary  to  be  watchful 
where  one  places  one's  friendship,  and  not  to  be  too  prodigal  of  it ;  for 
all  the  world  does  not  make  good  use  of  it,  and  often  there  are  false 
friends  who  seek  but  to  profit  by  the  confidence  one  reposes  in  them  to 
abuse  it,  either  for  their  own  ends  or  otherwise,  and  thus  do  us  much 
harm.  Therefore  I  advise  you,  my  dear  children,  never  to  be  precipitate 
in  placing  your  confidence  in  any  one  of  whom  you  are  not  very  sure, 
and  whom  you  have  not  tested  for  a  long  time,  for  people  in  this  world 
know  how  to  dissemble  for  a  long  time." 

Finally,  after  having  recommended  to  his  children  order,  a  wise 
economy,  a  horror  of  high  play,  harmony  among  themselves,  and 


THE    BETROTHAL. 


an  inviolable  attachment  to  the  head  of  the  house,  he  traces  for 
them  a  veritable  rule  of  life,  year  by  year,  week  by  week,  day  by 
day,  hour  by  hour,  and  finishes  with  these  grave  words:  — 

"  I  recommend  you  to  take  two  days  in  every  year  to  prepare  for  death, 
as  though  you  were  sure  that  those  two  were  the  last  days  of  your  life ; 
and  thus  you  will  accustom  yourself  to  know  what  you  ought  to  do  under 
those  circumstances,  and  when  your  last  moment  arrives,  you  will  not  be 
surprised,  but  will  know  what  you  have  to  do.  .  .  .  You  will  recognize 
the  utility  of  this  by  the  practice  of  it,  and  it  will  do  you  an  infinity  of 
good  without  doing  you  any  harm ;  for  you  will  be  doing  calmly  what 
perhaps  illness  or  lack  of  time  may  prevent  your  doing. 

"  I  herewith  command  you,"  he  concluded,  "  to  read  these  instructions 
twice  yearly ;  they  come  from  a  father  who  loves  you  above  everything, 
and  who  has  thought  it  necessary  to  leave  you  this  testimony  of  his  tender 
affection,  which  you  cannot  better  reciprocate  than  by  loving  one  another 
with  the  same  tenderness  he  bequeaths  to  all  of  you." 

Were  these  austere  precepts  followed?  Did  Marie  Antoinette, 
perchance,  amid  the  splendours  of  Versailles  and  the  allure- 
ments of  the  court,  stop  and  lose  herself  in  the  contemplation 
of  death  ?  We  know  not ;  but  does  it  not  seem  as  though  there 
were  some  mysterious  divination  of  his  daughter's  future  in  this 
last  counsel  of  the  father?  And  does  not  the  image  of  death, 
and  of  a  frightful  death,  seem  to  follow  with  threat  and  jeer  each 
step  of  the  historian  as  he  advances  in  the  biography  of  this 
gracious  and  unfortunate  queen? 

"  Over  what  people  wouldst  thou  like  to  reign  ? "  Maria 
Theresa  asked  Marie  Antoinette  one  day.  "  Over  the  French," 
the  child  replied  gayly,  "because  it  was  over  them  that  Henri  IV. 
and  Louis  XIV.  reigned,  —  the  Good  and  the  Great."  The  ex- 
pression was  happy;  and  the  empress  was  so  delighted  with  it 
that  she  begged  the  French  ambassador  to  communicate  it  im- 
mediately to  the  king,  his  master.  The  wishes  of  the  daughter 
were  in  harmony  with  the  policy  of  the  mother  in  favouring  a 
union  which  the  king  of  France  also  desired  no  less  than  they. 

The  arrangement  was  concluded  long  before  it  was  announced. 
Louis  XV.  informed  himself  through  his  minister  to  Vienna,  the 
Marquis  de  Durfort,  of  the  progress  and  education  of  the  arch- 
duchess. He  sent  the  painter  Ducreux  from  France  to  paint  her 
portrait;  and  the  portrait  finished,  he  was  in  such  haste  to  see  it 
that  the  ambassador  was  obliged  to  send  his  son  to  carry  it  to 
Versailles.  In  Germany  orders  were  given  to  repair  the  roads 


8  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

along  which  the  future  dauphiness  should  travel  into  France. 
At  Vienna  itself  Maria  Theresa  surrounded  her  daughter  with 
everything  that  might  keep  her  in  mind  of  France.  She  gave 
her  a  French  coiffure;  she  wished,  above  all,  to  give  her  a  French 
education,  and  with  this  end  in  view  she  begged  Choiseul  to 
choose  for  her  some  clever  and  loyal  tutor  who  could  train  the 
young  princess  in  the  usages  and  traditions  of  the  court  of  France. 
Choiseul  was  undecided,  when  the  archbishop  of  Toulouse,  Lo- 
menie  de  Brienne,  spoke  to  him  of  the  Abbe  de  Vermond,  libra- 
rian of  the  College  des  Ouatre  Nations.  The  praise  which  the 
prelate  bestowed  upon  his  protege  determined  the  minister's 
choice ;  and  a  few  days  later  the  Abbe  de  Vermond  set  out  for 
Vienna,  where  he  took  official  possession  of  his  post. 

The  Abbe  de  Vermond  was  of  a  grave  and  studious  disposi- 
tion, not  altogether  disinterested,  perhaps,  but  loyal,  despite  all 
that  Madame  Campan  has  said  in  her  "  Memoires,"  wherein  she 
sought  to  vilify  him,  no  doubt  from  professional  jealousy  and 
because  of  the  rivalry  of  their  positions ;  nor  did  he  ever  play 
that  odious  part  toward  his  royal  pupil  of  which  the  first  waiting- 
woman  has  accused  him.  He  did  not  seek,  "  from  cunning  and 
wicked  calculation,  to  keep  her  ignorant."  His  letters,  which  are 
now  known,  prove  that  he  conscientiously  fulfilled  his  mission, 
and  that  he  exerted  himself  without  ulterior  motive  to  fill  the 
gaps  which  the  mistaken  tenderness  of  the  Countess  von  Brandeiss 
had  left  in  the  education  of  the  archduchess. 

As  soon  as  he  arrived  in  Vienna  he  made  out  a  plan  of  instruc- 
tion, which  the  empress  approved.  This  embraced  the  study  of 
the  religion  and  history  of  France,  with  especial  attention  to  the 
characteristic  peculiarities  of  its  habits  and  customs,  an  acquaint- 
ance with  the  great  families,  and,  above  all,  with  those  whose 
members  held  offices  about  the  court,  a  general  survey  of  French 
literature,  and  particular  application  to  the  language  and  orthog- 
raphy. In  order  to  make  these  studies  interesting  to  a  young 
girl  who  was  little  habituated  to  restraint,  they  were  carried  on 
as  far  as  possible  by  conversation,  —  a  tempting  method,  which 
had  the  advantage  perhaps  of  instilling  knowledge  more  easily 
into  a  mind  so  difficult  to  fix,  but  which  had  the  serious  dis- 
advantage of  leaving  uncorrected  her  very  lack  of  industry,  a 
fault  inimical  to  any  real  progress. 

Sometimes,  when  he  was  tracing  the  general  history  of  the 
French  monarchy,  the  tutor  would  pause  to  sound  the  judgment 


EDUCATION. 


of  his  pupil  concerning  the  conduct  of  kings,  and  especially  of 
queens ;  and  he  had  the  pleasure  of  finding  that  her  judgment 
was  almost  always  just.  The  young  princess  possessed  a  re- 
markably clear  mind,  but  unfortunately  was  indolent  in  any  sus- 
tained exercise  of  it.  "  I  cannot  accustom  her,"  the  abbe  said, 
"  to  investigate  any  subject  thoroughly,  although  I  feel  that  she 
i.s  quite  capable  of  it."  When  one  considers  this,  and  the  gibes 
of  people  who  thought  that  the  education  of  the  archduchess 
was  becoming  too  French,  the  natural  jealousy  with  which  the 
natives  regarded  a  foreigner,  the  short  time  at  Vermond's  dis- 
posal,—  only  one  hour  a  day  at  Vienna,  —  the  obligatory  dis- 
tractions of  her  life,  which  was  beginning  to  be  less  secluded,  it 
is  easy  to  understand  that  the  progress  which  the  pupil  made 
was  not  as  rapid  as  the  master  desired. 

There  was  progress,  however.  At  Schoenbrunn,  where  one 
was  not  so  miserly  of  the  hours  devoted  to  study,  they  made  up 
in  the  conversations  for  what  had  not  been  done  in  the  regular 
lessons;  and  when  one  day  in  the  autumn  of  1769,  Maria  Theresa 
descended  to  her  daughter's  room,  and  questioned  her  for  nearly 
two  hours,  she  declared  herself  satisfied  with  her  improvement. 
She  found  her  "  entirely  capable  of  reasoning  and  of  judgment, 
above  all,  in  matters  of  conduct."  At  court,  where  the  arch- 
duchess appeared  more  and  more  frequently  as  the  time  of  her 
marriage  approached,  the  impression  she  made  was  not  less  fa- 
vourable. Every  one  was  both  surprised  and  charmed  by  the 
"  expression  of  kindness,  affability,  and  gayety  in  her  charming 
countenance." 

At  an  entertainment  given  to  her  at  Saxeburg,  on  the  Eve  of 
Saint  Antony,  the  young  princess  delighted  every  one  by  her 
bearing  and  conversation.  Even  Kaunitz,  blase  as  he  was,  was 
astonished.  Mercy,  who  had  come  to  Austria  in  the  beginning 
of  1770,  was  equally  flattered  to  see  that  the  future  dauphiness 
of  France  listened  to  him,  and  profited  by  his  counsel.  Little 
by  little  she  was  initiated  into  public  life  and  the  art  of  receiving. 
Twice  a  week  the  cavagnole  was  held  in  her  apartment,  and  on 
other  days  a  lottery.  The  princes  of  the  imperial  family  and 
the  ambassadors  were  admitted  ;  the  entertainment  continued 
until  ten  o'clock.  Marie  Antoinette,  or  rather  Madame  Antoine, 
—  it  was  the  name  they  still  gave  her,  —  exerted  herself  to  show 
an  interest  in  each  one ;  and  an  eye-witness  adds  that  she  suc- 
ceeded. "  This  noble  company  gave  her  the  best  bearing  and 


10  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

tone  possible ;  every  one  was  delighted  with  her,  and  the 
empress  more  than  all." 

Everything  was  preparing  for  her  approaching  union,  nor  were 
the  preparations  made  lightly.  The  mother  and  daughter  faced 
the  ambitious  future,  which  they  both  desired,  with  an  almost  re- 
ligious gravity.  It  was  decided  that  the  archduchess  should  go 
into  retreat  for  three  days  during  Holy  Week  under  the  direction 
of  the  Abbe  de  Vermond. 

Frivolous  as  she  was,  the  young  girl  meant  to  make  the  retreat 
a  serious  one;  she  even  regretted  that  it  was  to  be  so  short.  "It 
may  take  me  a  longer  time  to  lay  all  my  thoughts  before  you," 
she  remarked  to  her  preceptor. 

Her  departure  approached.  From  the  ist  of  July,  1769,  the 
Marquis  de  Durfort  had  been  arranging  the  details  of  the  mar- 
riage with  the  Prince  von  Kaunitz.  The  plan  of  the  contract 
was  submitted  to  the  king  on  his  return  from  Compiegne,  and  on 
the  1 3th  of  January,  1770,  the  last  note  from  the  court  of  Vienna 
was  transmitted  to  Versailles.  During  the  first  days  of  April 
the  official  congratulations  began ;  on  the  2d,  the  German  and 
Hungarian  gardes-nobles  were  admitted  to  kiss  the  hand  of  the 
archduchess ;  on  the  same  day  the  rector  of  the  University  de- 
livered an  address  to  her  in  Latin,  and  she  replied  in  the  same 
tongue ;  on  the  3d,  it  was  the  turn  of  the  officers  of  the  garrison 
and  of  the  magistrates. 

On  the  I4th  of  April  the  empress  announced  officially  to  her 
ministers  the  marriage  of  her  daughter  to  the  dauphin  of  France. 
On  the  1 6th,  the  "Gazette  de  France"  records,  "The  court  be- 
ing in  full  dress,  the  ambassador  of  France  had  a  solemn  audience 
with  their  Royal  and  Imperial  Majesties,  when,  in  the  name  of 
the  king,  his  master,  he  demanded  Madame  the  Archduchess 
Antoinette  as  consort  for  Monseigneur  the  Dauphin." 

After  this  ceremony  a  drawing-room  was  held  at  the  palace. 
When  the  ambassador  arrived  he  was  received  by  the  chief 
officers  of  their  Majesties;  the  palace  guards  lined  the  grand 
staircase ;  the  infantry  life  guards  were  in  the  first  antechamber ; 
the  German  and  Hungarian  gardes-nobles  formed  a  double  file  in 
the  other  rooms ;  and  the  court  was  both  numerous  and  brilliant. 
The  ambassador  went  first  to  have  audience  of  the  emperor, 
then  of  the  empress-queen,  of  whom  he  demanded,  in  the  name 
of  his  most  Christian  king,  the  hand  of  Madame  the  Archduchess. 
Her  Royal  and  Imperial  Majesty  having  given  her  consent,  her 


CELEBRATION  OF  THE  BETROTHAL.        II 

Royal  Highness  was  summoned  to  the  audience-chamber,  where, 
after  having  made  a  profound  reverence  to  the  empress  and  re- 
ceived her  permission,  she  took  from  the  hands  of  the  ambassa- 
dor a  letter  from  Monseigneur  the  Dauphin  and  a  portrait  of  that 
prince,  which  was  then  hung  round  her  neck  by  the  Countess  von 
Trautmansdorff,  head-mistress  of  the  household  of  her  Royal 
Highness.  Toward  half-past  eight  the  court  repaired  to  the  the- 
atre, which  was  magnificently  decorated  and  illuminated.  "  La 
Mere  Confidente,"  a  comedy  by  Marivaux,  was  given,  and  after- 
ward a  new  ballet  composed  by  Noverre,  called  "  Les  Bergers 
de  Tempe." 

On  the  following  day,  the  i/th,  pursuant  to  the  custom  ob- 
served under  such  circumstances  by  the  House  of  Austria,  the 
archduchess  made,  in  the  presence  of  the  ambassador  of  France 
and  of  the  emperor,  the  empress,  and  the  ministers  and  council- 
lors of  state,  her  renunciation  of  the  hereditary  succession,  both 
paternal  and  maternal.  The  Prince  von  Kaunitz  read  the  form  of 
the  renunciation;  Marie  Antoinette  signed  it,  and  took  her  oath 
upon  the  Bible,  which  the  Count  von  Herberstein,  coadjutor  of 
the  Prince-Bishop  von  Laybach,  held  for  her.  On  the  same  day 
the  emperor  gave  a  magnificent  entertainment  at  the  Belvedere ; 
a  hundred  men  had  worked  for  more  than  two  months  on  the 
preparations  for  it.  There  was  supper  for  fifteen  hundred  persons, 
a  masked  ball,  fireworks,  —  in  fact,  nothing  was  lacking  that  could 
add  to  the  brilliancy  of  the  celebration. 

On  the  1 8th  it  was  the  French  ambassador's  turn.  The  streets 
which  led  to  the  Lichtenstein  palace,  where  the  embassy  had  its 
lodging,  were  brilliantly  illuminated  ;  the  avenues,  the  entrance, 
the  interior,  were  all  decorated  in  exquisite  taste,  while  at  the 
foot  of  the  garden  rose  a  beautiful  edifice  representing  the  Tem- 
ple of  Hymen,  from  which  after  nightfall  rose  sparkling  sheaves 
of  sky-rockets. 

On  the  i Qth,  at  six  o'clock  in  the  evening,  the  whole  court 
betook  itself  to  the  Church  of  the  Augustines  through  the  gallery 
leading  from  the  palace,  which  was  guarded  on  either  side  by  a 
double  file  of  grenadiers.  The  empress  conducted  her  daughter, 
who  was  magnificently  attired  in  a  robe  of  cloth-of-silver,  while 
the  Countess  von  Trautmansdorff  carried  her  train.  The  Arch- 
duke Ferdinand  represented  the  dauphin.  When  the  emperor 
and  empress  were  seated  on  the  dais,  the  archduke  and  the 
archduchess  knelt  at  the  spot  prepared  for  them.  The  nuncio  of 


12  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  Pope,  Visconti,  blessed  the  rings,  and  gave  the  august  couple 
the  nuptial  benediction.  Then  he  entoned  the  Tc  Deum,  which 
was  sung  by  the  court  musicians  to  the  accompaniment  of  cannon 
and  musketry.  The  marriage  by  proxy  was  accomplished ;  the 
archduchess  was  now  dauphiness ;  and  the  Comte  de  Lorge,  son 
of  the  ambassador,  the  Marquis  de  Durfort,  immediately  set  out 
to  carry  the  news  to  Versailles. 

On  the  following  day  the  court  dined  in  public ;  a  drawing- 
room  was  held  in  the  evening,  and  a  medal  was  struck  bear- 
ing Hymen  and  Concord,  weaving  myrtle  wreaths  and  bearing 
horns  of  plenty,  with  this  device :  Concordia  novo  sanguinis  nexu 
firmata. 

Yet  in  the  midst  of  these  bewildering  fetes  and  striking  specta- 
cles, I  know  not  what  sadness  weighed  upon  all  hearts  and  op- 
pressed all  breasts.  Was  it  simple  grief  at  parting,  or  was  it 
that  mysterious  fear  which  in  solemn  hours  disturbs  even  the 
most  steadfast  souls?  However  brilliant  the  destiny  of  the  young 
bride  appeared,  the  future  was  clouded  by  uncertainty  and  the 
present  by  separation. 

Clear-sighted  as  she  was,  and  exactly  informed  by  her  faithful 
ambassador,  Mercy,  of  all  that  was  taking  place  at  the  French 
court,  Maria  Theresa  was  not  dazzled  by  the  great  future  opening 
before  her  daughter.  She  could  not  but  know  how  undermined 
and  tottering  was  the  throne  upon  which  the  archduchess  should 
one  day  sit.  A  story  is  told  that  before  the  departure  of  Marie 
Antoinette  she  was  desirous  of  consulting  a  celebrated  thau- 
maturgus,  Dr.  Gasser,  concerning  her  future.  The  doctor  re- 
garded the  young  princess  for  a  long  time,  hesitated  awhile,  and 
then  said  with  a  serious  mien  that  there  were  crosses  for  all 
shoulders. 

Whatever  may  be  the  truth  of  this  anecdote,  which  is  perhaps 
only  a  legend,  every  one  at  Vienna  grieved  over  the  departure  of 
the  young  princess  who  had  never  shown  anything  but  kindness 
and  graciousness  toward  them.  Men  and  women  all  felt  regret. 
The  avenues  and  the  streets  were  filled  with  a  sad-faced  crowd. 
"The  capital  of  Austria  presents  the  appearance  of  a  city  of 
mourning,"  one  eye-witness  writes. 

On  the  2  ist  of  April,  at  half-past  nine  in  the  morning,  the 
new  dauphiness  took  leave  of  her  mother,  and  set  forth  from  the 
city  of  Vienna,  which  she  was  never  to  see  again,  on  her  way  to 
France.  The  emperor  accompanied  her  as  far  as  Molek:  he 


THE   EMPRESS'S   COUNSEL  TO   HER   DAUGHTER.         13 

could  not  bring  himself  to  leave  his  sister,  whom  he  often  scolded, 
but  whom  he  loved  none  the  less.  When  on  the  following  day 
at  noon  he  re-entered  Vienna,  he  found  the  city  still  plunged  in 
sadness  and  Maria  Theresa  bathed  in  tears. 

On  the  day  of  departure,  the  2ist,  the  empress  had  roused 
herself  for  a  time  from  her  grief  to  trace  for  her  daughter  a  rule 
of  conduct  in  which  one  knows  not  whether  most  to  admire  the 
wisdom  of  her  policy,  the  insight  of  the  mother,  or  the  faith  of 
the  Christian. 

Like  the  Emperor  Francis,  she  sought  to  prepare  the  young 
princess  for  the  obstacles  she  might  find  along  her  path;  but 
being  addressed  to  Marie  Antoinette  alone,  her  instructions  were 
of  a  more  personal  and  precise  character.  Like  the  emperor, 
she  also  recommended  piety  above  everything  as  the  chief  and 
fundamental  virtue.  She  repeated  in  general  its  precepts,  those 
of  a  broad  and  indulgent  piety,  which  is  ever  a  refuge  for  those 
who  practise  it,  without  being  a  singularity  or  a  burden  to  others; 
nor  did  she  forget  the  duties  suited  to  the  exalted  position  her 
daughter  was  destined  to  fill,  and  certain  rules  of  conduct  peculiar 
to  the  court  of  France. 

"Do  not  undertake  any  recommendations,"  she  wrote;  "listen  to  no 
one,  if  you  would  be  at  peace.  Have  no  curiosity,  — this  is  a  fault  which 
I  fear  greatly  for  you ;  avoid  all  familiarity  with  your  inferiors.  Ask  of 
Monsieur  and  Madame  de  Noailles,  and  even  exact  of  them,  under  all  cir- 
cumstances, advice  as  to  what,  as  a  foreigner  and  being  desirous  of  pleasing 
the  nation,  you  should  do,  and  that  they  should  tell  you  frankly  if  there  be 
anything  in  your  bearing,  discourse,  or  any  point  which  you  should  correct. 
Reply  amiably  to  every  one,  and  with  grace  and  dignity  :  you  can  if  you  will. 
You  must  learn  to  refuse.  .  .  .  After  Strasburg  you  must  accept  nothing 
without  taking  counsel  of  Monsieur  and  Madame  de  Noailles  ;  and  you 
should  refer  to  them  every  one  who  would  speak  to  you  of  his  personal 
affairs,  saying  frankly  that  being  a  stranger  yourself,  you  cannot  undertake 
to  recommend  any  one  to  the  king.  If  you  wish  you  may  add,  in  order  to 
make  your  reply  more  emphatic,  '  The  empress,  my  mother,  has  expressly 
forbidden  me  to  undertake  any  recommendations.'  Do  not  be  ashamed 
to  ask  advice  of  any  one,  and  do  nothing  on  your  own  responsibility." 

Fifteen  days  later,  on  May  4,  the  cortege  being  then  not  far 
from  France,  the  empress,  who  could  not  console  herself  for  her 
daughter's  departure,  save  in  thinking  of  her  and  following  her 
in  every  stage  of  her  journey,  wrote  to  her  again  to  add  fresh 
counsel  for  the  conduct  of  her  life. 


14  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

"  You  will  find  a  tender  father  who  will  also  be  your  friend  if  you  de- 
serve it,"  she  said.  "  Put  entire  confidence  in  him  ;  you  will  run  no  risk. 
Love  him,  obey  him,  seek  to  divine  his  thoughts ;  you  cannot  do  enough 
at  this  moment,  when  I  am  losing  you.  .  .  .  Concerning  the  dauphin,  I 
shall  say  nothing ;  you  know  my  delicacy  on  this  point.  A  wife  should  be 
submissive  in  everything  to  her  husband,  and  should  have  no  thought  but 
to  please  him  and  to  do  his  will.  .  .  .  The  only  true  happiness  in  this 
world  lies  in  a  happy  marriage ;  I  know  whereof  I  speak.  Everything 
depends  on  the  wife  if  she  be  yielding,  sweet,  and  amusing. 

"I  counsel  you,  my  dear  daughter,  to  re-read  my  paper  on  the  2ist  of 
every  month.  I  beg  you  to  be  true  to  me  on  this  point.  My  only  fear 
for  you  is  negligence  in  your  prayers  and  studies  ;  and  lukewarmness  suc- 
ceeds negligence.  Fight  against  it,  for  it  is  more  dangerous  than  a  more 
reprehensible,  even  wicked,  state ;  one  can  conquer  that  more  easily. 
Love  your  family ;  be  affectionate  to  them,  —  to  your  aunts  as  well  as  to 
your  brothers-in-law  and  sisters-in-law.  Suffer  no  evil-speaking  ;  you  must 
either  silence  the  persons,  or  escape  it  by  withdrawing  from  them.  If  you 
value  your  peace  of  mind,  you  must  from  the  start  avoid  this  pitfall,  which 
I  greatly  fear  for  you,  knowing  your  curiosity." 

In  the  mean  while  the  dauphiness  was  traversing  Germany. 
On  the  25th  she  arrived  at  Munich  ;  on  the  29th  at  Augsburg; 
on  the  3Oth  at  Gunzburg.  All  along  her  route  the  people  assem- 
bled in  crowds,  anxious  to  see  an  archduchess  of  Austria  and 
dauphiness  of  France;  they  returned  charmed  by  her  conde- 
scension, her  beauty,  her  amiability,  and  her  air  of  sweetness. 
During  her  journey  the  ladies  who  accompanied  her  sought  to 
divert  her.  One  of  them  having  been  indiscreet  enough  to  say  to 
her,  "Are  you  very  anxious  to  see  Monseigneur  the  Dauphin?" 
the  young  princess  replied  in  a  tone  of  dignity,  "  Madame,  I 
shall  be  at  Versailles  in  five  days;  on  the  sixth  I  can  more  easily 
answer  your  question."  Having  administered  this  reproof,  she 
resumed  her  air  of  gayety  and  amiability,  but  her  thoughts  turned 
obstinately  toward  her  native  country  and  those  she  was  leaving 
behind.  When  they  crossed  the  boundaries  of  the  provinces 
under  the  dominion  of  the  empress,  she  burst  into  tears. 
"  Alas !  "  she  cried,  "  I  shall  never  see  her  again !  " 

It  was  the  last  cry  of  her  heart,  her  farewell  to  all  the  associa- 
tions of  childhood,  to  all  her  family  ties,  to  all  that  she  had  loved 
in  her  German  fatherland.  From  the  moment  she  set  foot  on 
France  she  felt  herself  a  Frenchwoman. 


CHAPTER    II. 

THE  DAUPHINESS  OF  FRANCE.  —  STRASBURG.  —  NANCY.  —  RHEIMS.  — 
COMPIEGNE. —  PORTRAIT  OF  THE  DAUPHINESS.  —  MARIE  ANTOINETTE 
AT  ST.  DENYS.  —  SUPPER  AT  LA  MUETTE  WITH  MADAME  DU 
BARRY.  —  CELEBRATION  OF  THE  MARRIAGE  AT  VERSAILLES.  — 
THE  PRETENSIONS  OF  THE  PRINCESSES  OF  THE  HOUSE  OF  LOR- 
RAINE. — CELEBRATIONS  IN  PARIS.  —  THE  CATASTROPHE  ON  LA 
PLACE  Louis  XV.  —  LETTER  FROM  THE  DAUPHIN  TO  THE  LIEU- 
TENANT OF  THE  POLICE. 

ON  the  3d  of  May,  the  Comte  de  Noailles,  ambassador 
extraordinary  to  meet  the  dauphiness,  entered  Strasburg. 
It  was  in  that  city,  won  for  France  by  Louis  XIV.,  that  he  was 
to  greet  in  the  name  of  France  the  wife  of  the  great-grandson  of 
Louis  XIV.  On  the  5th  of  May  the  Comtesse  de  Noailles,  lady- 
in-waiting,  the  Comte  de  Tesse,  chief  equerry,  the  Comte  de  Saulx, 
gentleman-in-waiting,  arrived  in  their  turn  with  the  household  of 
the  dauphiness.  Finally  on  the  7th,  toward  noon,  Marie  An- 
toinette herself  appeared  on  the  banks  of  the  Rhine. 

On  an  island  in  the  middle  of  the  river  a  pavilion  had  been 
erected,  destined  for  the  ceremony  of  the  delivery,  as  it  was 
called ;  that  is,  the  moment  when  the  young  princess  should 
pass  from  the  hands  of  her  German  household  into  those  of  her 
French  household.  By  a  strange  want  of  thought  the  tapestries 
chosen  from  the  collection  belonging  to  the  crown  to  decorate 
the  great  hall  which  for  the  first  time  should  shelter  beneath  a 
French  roof  the  young  wife  on  her  way  to  join  her  husband, 
represented  the  unhappy  loves  and  bloody  quarrels  of  Jason  and 
Medea;  in  other  words,  a  "  picture  of  the  most  unfortunate  union 
that  ever  took  place."  Strange  pictures,  and  a  strange  welcome  ! 
Goethe,  who  was  then  a  student  at  Strasburg,  was  struck  on 
seeing  these  tapestries  as  with  a  gloomy  presage,  and  it  is  said 
that  the  archduchess  on  perceiving  them  could  not  restrain  an 
expression  of  fear.  "Ah,"  she  cried,  "  what  an  omen  !  " 


16  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

The  pavilion  of  the  Rhine  was  divided  into  three  rooms :  in 
the  middle  a  vast  salon,  where  the  delivery  was  to  take  place ; 
to  the  right  and  left  two  apartments,  one  occupied  by  the  French 
household,  the  other  by  the  German.  It  was  in  the  latter  that 
the  dauphiness  had  to  undergo  the  trying  ceremony  of  the 
toilette.  Etiquette  demanded  that  she  should  discard  everything 
that  could  remind  her  of  her  native  country,  even  to  her  stockings 
and  underlinen.  When  she  had  submitted  to  this  vexatious  oper- 
ation, and  was  re-dressed  in  the  costume  sent  from  Paris,  "  she 
looked  a  thousand  times  more  charming  in  the  French  fashion 
than  she  did  before,"  an  eye-witness  wrote.  The  doors  were 
opened;  the  dauphiness  passed  into  the  central  salon,  where 
she  was  received  by  the  Comte  de  Noailles,  Bouret,  secretary  of 
the  king's  cabinet,  and  Gerard,  first  secretary  of  foreign  affairs. 
When  full  powers  had  been  exchanged,  and  the  documents  of 
delivery  and  reception  had  been  signed  by  the  respective  com- 
missioners, the  room  where  the  French  household  was  waiting 
was  opened.  The  dauphiness,  lithe  and  graceful,  advanced 
toward  the  Comtesse  de  Noailles,  threw  herself  into  her  arms, 
and  begged  her  to  be  her  guide,  her  support,  her  consolation. 
At  that  moment  the  ladies  of  the  German  household  approached 
their  young  mistress  to  kiss  her  hand  for  a  last  time,  and  then 
retired  ;  she  pressed  them  to  her  heart,  weeping,  and  charged 
them  with  many  tender  messages  for  her  mother,  her  sisters,  her 
friends  at  Vienna ;  then  turning  toward  her  French  ladies,  she 
said,  smiling  through  her  tears,  "  Pardon  me,  these  are  for  the 
family  and  the  fatherland  I  am  leaving;  for  the  future  I  shall  not 
forget  that  I  am  French." 

The  city  of  Strasburg  was  in  gala  array.  It  had  prepared  for 
the  dauphiness  the  splendours  it  had  displayed  twenty-five  years 
before  for  the  journey  of  Louis  the  Well-beloved.  Twelve  years 
later  Marie  Antoinette  still  preserved  a  grateful  memory  of  it. 
It  was  there,  she  said,  that  she  had  received  the  first  homage  of 
the  French,  and  had  realized  the  happiness  of  becoming  their 
queen.  Three  companies  of  young  children  of  from  twelve  to 
fifteen  years  of  age,  habited  as  Cent-Suisscs,  formed  the  line  along 
the  passage  of  the  princess.  Twenty-four  young  girls  of  the  most 
distinguished  families  of  Strasburg,  dressed  in  the  national  cos- 
tume, strewed  flowers  before  her;  and  eighteen  shepherds  and 
shepherdesses  presented  her  with  baskets  of  flowers.  When  she 
set  foot  on  the  territory  of  the  city  Monsieur  d'Antigny,  the  chief 


STRASBURG.  17 


magistrate,  addressed  her  in  German.  "  Do  not  speak  German, 
Monsieur,"  she  said;  "from  to-day  I  understand  no  other  lan- 
guage but  French." 

When  she  entered  the  city  in  the  coach  of  the  king  a  triple 
discharge  of  artillery  greeted  her,  all  the  bells  rang  out,  and  the 
Marechal  de  Contades  received  her  under  a  magnificent  trium- 
phal arch.  On  the  square  in  front  of  the  city  hall  fountains  of 
wine  ran  for  the  people,  whole  beeves  were  roasted,  and  the  dis- 
tribution of  bread  was  so  abundant  that  no  one  took  the  trouble 
to  pick  up  the  pieces. 

The  dauphiness  traversed  the  city  between  a  double  file  of 
soldiers,  and  descended  at  the  episcopal  palace,  where  the  Car- 
dinal de  Rohan,  bishop  of  Strasburg,  presented  the  chapter  to  her. 
In  the  evening  there  was  a  grand  banquet,  presentation  of  the 
ladies  of  the  nobility,  plays  given  by  the  various  guilds,  a  dance 
executed  by  the  coopers,  and  a  spectacle  at  the  Com^die  Fran- 
(jaise.  When  night  fell  the  entire  city  seemed  to  be  on  fire :  the 
houses  and  public  edifices  were  illuminated;  lines  of  fire  outlined 
the  cathedral  from  top  to  bottom,  throwing  into  luminous  relief 
the  graceful  details  of  Envin  von  Steinbach's  masterpiece.  Oppo- 
site the  bishop's  palace,  on  the  other  side  of  the  river,  was  a  vast 
colonnade,  under  the  arches  of  which  gardens  were  seen  stretch- 
ing away  into  the  distance;  an  artificial  parterre  carried  on  boats 
floated  on  the  river  adjoining  the  gardens,  and  the  trees  twinkled 
with  coloured  globes.  At  the  same  time  a  magnificent  display  of 
fireworks  on  the  island,  representing  hundreds  of  mythological 
figures,  coats-of-arms,  chariots,  marine  gods,  the  intertwined 
monogram  of  the  dauphin  and  dauphiness,  transformed  the  river 
into  a  sheet  of  fire. 

On  the  following  day,  the  8th,  Marie  Antoinette  visited  the 
cathedral.  By  a  strange  coincidence  the  prelate  who  awaited  her 
with  the  chapter  at  the  entrance  to  felicitate  her,  and  who  greeted 
in  her  "  the  soul  of  Maria  Theresa  about  to  unite  itself  to  the 
soul  of  the  Bourbons,"  was  the  nephew  of  the  bishop,  that  prince, 
Louis  de  Rohan,  who  was  later  to  inflict  upon  the  dauphiness, 
become  queen,  the  deadliest  of  injuries.  But  in  the  midst  of  the 
then  so  brilliant  prospect  who  could  discern  these  shadows? 

From  Strasburg  the  dauphiness  went  to  Saverne,  where  she 
was  lodged  in  the  chateau  of  the  bishops.  The  Cardinal  de  Rohan 
presented  to  her  a  woman  who  was  a  hundred  years  old,  and  who 
had  never  been  ill.  "  Princess,"  the  woman  said  to  her  in  Ger- 

VOL.  I. — 2 


18  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

man,  "  I  pray  to  Heaven  that  you  may  live  to  be  as  old  as  I,  and 
as  free  from  infirmities."  "  I  hope  I  may,"  replied  the  dauphiness, 
"  if  it  be  for  the  good  of  France."  After  giving  her  her  hand  to 
kiss,  she  ordered  a  sum  of  money  to  be  given  to  her. 

In  the  evening  there  was  a  ball ;  after  the  ball  fireworks ;  after 
the  fireworks  a  supper,  at  which  for  the  last  time  the  ladies  of  the 
German  household  of  Marie  Antoinette  met  together  with  the 
ladies  of  the  French  household.  On  the  9th  they  definitely  took 
leave  of  the  archduchess,  the  Prince  von  Stahremberg  alone  re- 
maining to  accompany  her. 

The  dauphiness  left  Alsace  delighted  with  the  welcome  which 
she  had  there  received.  The  peasants  collected  from  all  parts 
along  her  route;  the  roads  were  strewn  with  flowers;  young  girls 
in  their  best  frocks  brought  her  bouquets.  The  population  of  the 
country,  ever  eager  for  a  spectacle,  and  then  so  ardent  in  their 
love  for  their  princes,  pressed  close  to  the  carriage,  and  per- 
ceiving through  the  window  the  fresh  and  gracious  countenance 
of  the  young  woman,  they  cried,  "  How  pretty  our  dauphiness 
is !  "  A  lady  of  her  suite  who  overheard  this  repeated  it  to  the 
princess.  "  Madame,"  replied  Marie  Antoinette,  "  the  French 
look  upon  me  with  indulgent  eyes." 

On  the  evening  of  the  Qth  the  dauphiness  arrived  at  Nancy, 
illuminated  as  Strasburg  had  been.  Nancy  was  the  cradle  of  the 
House  of  Lorraine,  the  birthplace  of  the  Emperor  Francis;  it 
was  the  last  bond  of  union  between  the  family  of  her  origin  and 
the  family  of  her  adoption,  —  between  Austria  and  France.  On 
the  following  day,  after  the  official  ceremonies,  she  betook  herself 
to  the  convent  of  the  Cordeliers  to  kneel  at  the  tomb  of  her  fore- 
fathers. The  grave  idea  of  death  mingled  with  the  excitement  of 
the  celebrations. 

That  evening  Marie  Antoinette  slept  at  Bar;  at  Luneville  the 
gendarmerie,  on  the  order  of  the  Marquis  de  Castries  and  the  Mar- 
quis d'Autichamp,  accorded  her  military  honours.  At  Commercy 
the  archduchess  received  a  token  of  homage  that  went  more 
directly  to  her  heart:  a  fair-haired  child  of  ten  offered  her  a 
bouquet,  and  greeted  her  as  "  the  descendant  of  a  family  who 
for  almost  a  thousand  years  had  reigned  over  the  hearts  of  the 
people  of  Lorraine." 

A  few  miles  from  Chalons  an  old  country  cure\  surrounded 
by  his  parishioners,  approached  the  dauphiness's  coach  to  pay 
his  respects.  He  had  taken  as  the  text  for  his  discourse  the 


RHEIMS.  19 

words  from  the  Canticle  of  Canticles :  "  Pulchra  es  et  formosa." 
But  at  the  sight  of  the  princess  respect,  emotion,  and  surprise  so 
disturbed  him  that  he  could  not  proceed  farther  than  his  text. 
He  racked  his  brains  in  vain ;  his  memory  obstinately  deserted 
him.  Marie  Antoinette,  perceiving  this,  and  in  order  to  put  an 
end  to  the  embarrassment  of  the  good  man,  took  from  his  hand, 
with  a  charming  smile  of  thanks,  the  bouquet  which  he  had 
for  her.  "  Ah,  Madame,"  cried  the  good  cure,  recovering,  if 
not  his  discourse,  at  least  his  presence  of  mind,  "  do  not  be  as- 
tonished at  my  lack  of  memory ;  at  sight  of  you  Solomon  would 
have  forgotten  his  address,  and  would  never  more  have  thought 
of  the  beautiful  Egyptian  !  " 

On  the  nth  the  dauphiness  descended  at  the  Hotel  de  1'Inten- 
dance  at  Chalons.  Six  young  girls,  dowered  by  the  city  on  the 
occasion  of  her  marriage,  recited  these  lines  to  her: — 

"  Princess,  who  with  wit,  loveliness,  and  grace 
Comes  to  add  lustre  to  our  race, 
On  this  day  memorable  what  happiness  we  Ve  won ! 
'T  is  to  thy  splendid  nuptials  that  we  owe  our  own. 
From  this  proud  alliance  two  benefits  shall  spring 
To  tune  the  State  in  greater  consonance : 
We  shall  give  subjects  liege  to  France, 
While  you  shall  give  to  her  her  king." 

In  the  evening  there  was  a  representation,  when  "  La  Partie  de 
Chasse  de  Henri  IV."  was  played,  a  supper  in  public,  an  illumi- 
nation which  represented  the  temple  of  Hymen,  the  inauguration 
of  a  new  gate  to  the  city,  of  which  the  dauphiness  accepted  the 
dedication,  distribution  of  bread,  wine,  and  meat,  and  repeated 
acclamations  of  "Long  live  the  King!  Long  live  Madame  the 
Dauphiness !  " 

On  the  1 2th  Marie  Antoinette  passed  through  Rheims,  the 
coronation  city.  "  This  is  the  city  of  France,"  she  said  tactfully, 
"  which  I  hope  to  revisit  at  the  latest  possible  date." 

That  evening  she  arrived  at  Soissons,  surrounded  by  a  body- 
guard which  had  accompanied  her  from  Fismes.  The  citizens 
and  the  arquebusiers  met  her  at  the  gates  of  the  city.  The 
streets  which  led  to  the  bishop's  palace,  where  the  princess  was 
to  lodge,  were  decorated  in  a  singular  and  picturesque  fashion. 
There  was  a  double  row  of  fruit-trees,  twenty-five  feet  high,  be- 
tween which  hung  garlands  of  ivy,  flowers,  gold  and  silver 
gauze,  interspersed  with  lanterns.  The  dauphiness  was  received 


20  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

at  the  steps  of  the  palace  by  the  bishop-duke  of  Soissons,  and 
conducted  to  her  apartment  through  a  gallery  lighted  by  a  thou- 
sand candles.  Distributions  were  made  to  the  people,  and  in  the 
evening  a  wonderful  display  of  fireworks  showed  to  the  enthusias- 
tic crowd  a  temple  surmounted  by  two  groups  :  Fame  announcing 
the  dauphiness  of  France,  and  a  genius  presenting  to  Fame  her 
portrait. 

On  the  following  day,  faithful  to  the  teachings  of  her  mother, 
Marie  Antoinette  received  the  communion  from  the  hands  of  the 
bishop  in  the  palace  chapel,  and  in  the  evening  assisted  at  a  sol- 
emn Te  Deum  in  the  cathedral.  In  the  afternoon  of  the  I4th  she 
set  out  on  the  road  to  Compiegne. 

In  one  of  the  towns  through  which  she  passed,  some  professors 
and  students  paid  their  respects  to  her  in  Latin,  and  she  was 
sufficiently  learned  to  reply  to  the  young  Ciceros  in  the  same 
tongue. 

The  whole  journey  from  Strasburg  to  Compiegne  had  been 
one  long  and  brilliant  triumph  for  the  princess.  Everywhere 
along  her  route  the  people  in  gala  attire  had  crowded ;  every- 
where she  had  bewitched  them  by  the  condescension  of  her  bear- 
ing, the  freshness  of  her  smile,  the  kindliness  of  her  greeting,  the 
propriety  of  her  remarks,  —  by  "  her  gentle  gayety  and  dignified 
affability,"  the  "Gazette"  said.  "A  touching  spectacle,"  added 
the  editor,  "  for  a  nation  whose  chief  sentiment  is  a  love  of  their 
rulers."  Every  one  who  saw  the  dauphiness  went  away  delighted  ; 
every  one  who  heard  her  was  in  raptures.  "  Our  archduchess- 
dauphiness  has  surpassed  all  my  hopes,"  Mercy  wrote. 

The  entire  royal  family  was  assembled  at  Compiegne.  The 
king  had  already  sent  the  Marquis  de  Chauvelin  to  Chalons,  the 
Due  d'Aumont  to  Soissons,  the  Due  de  Choiseul  some  leagues 
from  Compiegne,  to  meet  the  dauphiness.  He  himself  left  Ver- 
sailles on  the  1 3th  with  the  dauphin  and  Mesdames,  slept  at 
Muette,  and  arrived  at  Compiegne  on  the  I4th,  there  to  await  the 
wife  of  his  grandson.  The  meeting  took  place  at  the  Pont  de 
Berne,  in  the  middle  of  the  forest.  As  soon  as  the  young  prin- 
cess perceived  the  king,  she  jumped  from  her  carriage,  and  ran  and 
threw  herself  at  his  feet.  Enchanted  by  her  impulsive  abandon, 
Louis  XV.  raised  her,  embraced  her  with  great  tenderness,  and 
presented  her  to  the  dauphin,  who  according  to  etiquette  kissed 
her  upon  the  cheek.  They  returned  to  the  chateau,  the  king  on 
the  back  seat  of  the  carriage  with  the  dauphiness  by  his  side,  the 


PORTRAIT   OF   THE   DAUPHINESS.  21 

dauphin  on  the  front  seat  with  the  Comtesse  de  Noailles.  The 
king  and  the  dauphin  themselves  conducted  the  dauphiness  to  her 
apartment,  and  there  presented  to  her  in  turn  the  members  of 
the  royal  family,  —  the  Due  d'Orleans,  the  Due  and  Duchesse  de 
Chartres,  the  Prince  de  Conde,  the  Due  and  Duchesse  de  Bour- 
bon, the  Prince  de  Conti,  the  Comte  and  Comtesse  de  la  Marche, 
the  Due  de  Penthievre,  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe.  The  king 
was  delighted  with  this  first  interview;  he  found  the  dauphiness 
charming. 

She  was  indeed  charming ;  and  the  descriptions  which  the  au- 
thors of  that  period  have  left  readily  explain  the  impression  pro- 
duced by  so  young  and  fresh  an  apparition  on  that  aged  monarch, 
who  was  not  accustomed  to  find  so  much  grace  and  so  much 
modesty  combined. 

"The  dauphiness,"  writes  one  chronicler,  "  was  very  well  made 
and  well  proportioned  in  all  her  limbs."  Her  figure,  which  was 
slender  and  tall,  had  at  the  same  time  all  the  suppleness  of  the 
young  girl  and  the  dignity  of  the  woman.  Her  features  perhaps 
were  not  mathematically  regular ;  they  were  pretty  rather  than 
beautiful :  the  oval  of  her  face  was  somewhat  too  long,  and  her 
lips,  particularly  the  under  one,  had  the  thickness  characteristic 
of  the  Austrian  lip.  But  her  mouth  was  small  and  well  arched ; 
her  arms  superb  ;  her  hands  perfectly  formed  ;  her  feet  charming ; 
her  nose  aquiline,  delicate,  and  pretty.  Her  hair,  of  a  pale  blond 
colour  of  a  peculiar  shade,  crowned  a  forehead  of  marvellous 
purity.  Her  eyes,  which  were  blue  without  being  pale,  sweet 
but  not  languishing,  sparkled  with  vivacity  and  intelligence,  and 
lighted  up  with  a  bewitching  smile.  Her  complexion  was  of  daz- 
zling brilliancy,  incomparably  white,  and  relieved  by  a  colour 
which  had  no  need  of  rouge  ;  her  skin  was  of  such  transparency 
that  it  took  no  shadow,  and  was  the  despair  of  painters.  "  She  was 
not  beautiful,"  one  of  her  contemporaries  has  said  of  her;  "she 
was  better  than  beautiful."  Her  walk  exhibited  at  the  same  time 
the  imposing  air  of  the  princesses  of  her  family  and  all  the  French 
grace.  All  her  motions  were  marked  by  suppleness  and  elegance  : 
she  did  not  walk ;  she  glided.  When  she  traversed  the  galleries 
of  the  chateau,  her  head,  which  she  had  a  peculiar  and  alto- 
gether charming  fashion  of  carrying  bowed  and  then  raising  more 
haughtily  when  she  thought  herself  alone,  —  her  head,  carried  on 
her  beautiful  Greek  neck,  gave  her  so  much  majesty  that  it  seemed 
as  though  one  saw  a  goddess  in  the  midst  of  her  nymphs.  "  If  one 


22  LIFE  OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

should  see  her  in  the  most  humble  garb,"  a  traveller  wrote  who 
saw  her  for  a  moment  during  her  journey,  "  it  would  be  easy  to 
divine  that  she  had  been  born  upon  the  throne ;  "  and  a  celebrated 
Englishman,  Horace  Walpole,  cried  on  perceiving  her,  "  She  is 
grace  personified !  " 

A  painter,  having  her  portrait  to  paint,  thought  he  could  not 
do  better  than  to  place  it  in  the  centre  of  an  open  rose ;  and  a 
poet  added,  — 

"  'T  is  the  branch  of  a  rose 
Come  to  join  our  fair  lily." 

On  the  evening  of  her  arrival  at  Compiegne  the  ladies  who  pre- 
sided at  her  undress  having  said  to  her,  "  Madame,  you  delight 
every  one,"  she  replied :  "  They  view  me  with  too  great  partiality ; 
my  heart  is  contracting  debts  which  it  can  never  repay.  I  trust 
every  one  will  credit  me  with  the  wish  I  have  of  doing  so." 

On  the  1 5th  of  May  the  court  left  Compiegne.  The  cortege 
halted  at  St.  Denys.  Marie  Antoinette  went  to  see  the  daughter 
of  Louis  XV.,  Madame  Louise,  who  had  entered  the  Carmelites 
a  little  while  before.  She  remained  half  an  hour,  and  charmed 
every  one.  "  Here  is,  my  dear  mother,"  a  nun  of  St.  Denys 
wrote  to  a  Carmelite  of  the  Rue  St.  Jaques,  — "  here  is  a 
perfect  princess  in  face,  figure,  and  manner,  and  what  is  more 
precious,  they  say  that  she  is  delightfully  pious !  Her  physiog- 
nomy exhibits  an  expression  of  majesty,  modesty,  and  sweet- 
ness. The  king,  Mesdames,  and,  above  all,  Monseigneur  the 
Dauphin,  seemed  enchanted  with  her,  and  vied  with  one  another 
in  repeating,  '  She  is  incomparable  !  ' ' 

All  along  the  route  of  the  procession  the  spectators  were  not 
less  enraptured.  The  rumour  of  the  passage  of  the  dauphiness 
had  spread ;  the  inhabitants  of  Paris  had  congregated  en  masse 
between  Versailles  and  the  Porte  Maillot ;  the  carriages  formed  a 
double  line ;  the  people  applauded ;  the  crowd  was  so  compact 
that  the  royal  equipage  had  to  proceed  at  a  walk.  When  the 
attention  of  the  princess  was  called  to  this  great  affluence,  she, 
with  her  perfect  amiability  and  fine  tact,  feigned  to  believe  that 
all  this  homage  was  intended  for  the  old  monarch.  "  The  French 
can  never  see  enough  of  their  king,"  she  said  ;  "  they  cannot  treat 
me  with  more  kindness  than  in  proving  to  me  that  they  know  how 
to  love  one  whom  I  am  already  accustomed  to  regard  as  a  second 
father." 

At  seven  o'clock  in  the  evening  Marie  Antoinette  arrived  at 


CELEBRATION   AT   VERSAILLES.  23 

La  Muette.  There  the  king  awaited  her,  and  with  him  the  Comte 
de  Provence,  the  Comte  d'Artois,  Madame  Clotilde,  and  also, 
alas  !  that  miserable  woman  at  whose  feet  Louis  XV.  dishonoured 
the  most  beautiful  crown  in  existence,  and  who  had  elicited  from 
his  culpable  condescension  permission  to  sup  with  the  dauphiness. 
The  young  princess  was  profoundly  hurt :  her  proud  purity  re- 
volted against  the  impure  contact  which  the  despotic  weakness 
of  the  old  king  imposed  upon  her;  but  she  had  sufficient  self- 
control  to  give  no  outward  sign  of  her  secret  displeasure.  After 
supper  one  of  the  courtiers  who  lay  in  wait  for  her  inexperience 
asked  her  how  she  had  found  the  Comtesse  du  Barry.  She  dis- 
cerned the  trap,  and  answered  simply,  "  Charming." 

Was  it  to  forestall  or  to  weaken  the  bad  impression  produced 
by  this  strange  society  that  Louis  XV.  carried  to  his  granddaugh- 
ter at  La  Muette  a  magnificent  set  of  diamonds,  and  on  the  day 
following  the  marriage  sent  to  her  a  chest  exquisitely  carved  by 
Bocciardi,  full  of  ornaments?  He  ever  overwhelmed  her  with 
presents.  He  gave  her  all  the  diamonds  and  pearls  of  the  late 
dauphiness,  and  he  added  the  collar  of  pearls  formerly  worn 
by  Anne  of  Austria,  and  entailed  by  her  on  the  queens  and 
dauphinesses  of  France ;  the  smallest  of  these  pearls  was  as 
large  as  a  nut. 

On  Wednesday,  the  i6th  of  May,  at  nine  o'clock,  Marie  An- 
toinette left  La  Muette  for  Versailles,  where  her  toilette  was  to  take 
place.  The  king  and  the  dauphin  had  preceded  her  the  evening 
before.  When  she  arrived  at  the  chateau,  the  kin^  received  her 

O 

on  the  ground-floor,  discoursed  for  some  time  with  her,  and 
presented  to  her  Madame  Elisabeth,  the  Comtesse  de  Clermont, 
and  the  Princesse  de  Conti.  At  one  o'clock  she  went  to  the  apart- 
ment of  the  king,  whence  the  cortege  started  for  the  chapel. 

The  dauphin  and  the  dauphiness,  followed  by  the  old  monarch, 
advanced  toward  the  altar  and  knelt  on  a  cushion  placed  on  the 
steps  of  the  sanctuary.  The  archbishop  of  Rheims,  Monseigneur 
de  la  Roche- Aymon,  grand  almoner,  offered  them  the  holy  water, 
then  after  having  exhorted  the  young  couple,  blessed  the  thirteen 
pieces  of  gold  and  the  ring.  The  dauphin  took  the  ring  and 
placed  it  on  the  fourth  finger  of  the  dauphiness,  and  gave  her 
the  gold-pieces.  The  archbishop  pronounced  the  nuptial  bene- 
diction, and  as  soon  as  the  king  had  returned  to  his  prie-Dicn, 
opened  the  mass.  The  royal  choir  sang  a  motet  by  the  Abbe 
de  Ganzargue;  after  the  offertory  the  dauphin  and  dauphiness 


24  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

went  to  make  their  offering.  At  the  Pater  a  canopy  of  silver  bro- 
cade was  spread  above  their  heads,  —  the  bishop  of  Senlis,  Mon- 
seigneur  de  Roquelaure,  grand  almoner  to  the  king,  holding  it  on 
the  side  of  the  dauphin,  and  the  bishop  of  Chartres,  grand  almoner 
to  the  dauphiness,  holding  it  on  the  side  of  that  princess. 

At  the  end  of  the  mass  the  grand  almoner  approached  the  pric- 
Dieu  of  the  king  and  presented  to  him  the  marriage  register  of 
the  royal  parish,  which  the  cure  had  carried.  Then  the  cortege 
returned  to  the  king's  apartment  in  the  same  order,  and  the 
dauphiness,  alter  going  to  her  own  apartment,  received  the 
officers  of  her  household  and  the  foreign  ambassadors. 

An  immense  crowd  filled  the  royal  city.  Paris  was  deserted : 
the  shops  were  closed ;  the  entire  population  had  betaken  itself 
to  Versailles  to  assist  at  the  celebrations  and  fireworks  which 
were  to  finish  the  day. 

But  at  three  o'clock  the  sky  became  overcast ;  a  violent  storm 
burst;  the  fireworks  could  not  be  set  off;  the  illuminations  were 
drowned  by  the  rain ;  and  the  crowd  of  curious  people  who  filled 
the  gardens  and  streets  were  obliged  to  flee  in  disorder  before  the 
peals  of  thunder  and  torrents  of  rain. 

In  the  chateau,  however,  the  day  ended  brilliantly.  The  court- 
iers, in  sumptuous  attire,  eager  to  see  and  above  all  to  be  seen, 
crowded  the  apartments ;  a  magnificent  supper  was  served  in  the 
theatre,  transformed  into  a  banqueting-hall  and  lighted  by  "  a 
prodigious  number  of  candles."  "  All  the  ladies  in  full  dress  in 
the  front  of  the  boxes  presented  a  sight  as  surprising  as  it  was 
magnificent."  The  court  had  never  seemed  so  brilliant. 

At  six  o'clock  a  drawing-room  was  held,  games  of  lansquenet, 
and  a  state  dinner.  In  the  evening  the  king  conducted  the  newly 
married  couple  to  their  room.  The  archbishop  of  Rheims  blessed 
the  bed.  The  king  gave  the  chemise  to  the  dauphin,  the  Duchesse 
de  Chartres  to  the  dauphiness.  But  despite  the  splendour  of  the 
celebrations  and  the  promising  aspect  of  the  future  at  that  mo- 
ment, certain  obstinate  pessimists  could  not  help  regarding  the 
rumbling  of  the  storm  as  a  menace  from  Heaven  ;  and  the  super- 
stitious recalled  that  the  young  wife,  in  signing  the  marriage  regis- 
ter, had  let  fall  a  blot  of  ink  which  had  effaced  half  her  name. 

On  the  following  day  began  at  Versailles  a  long  series  of  splen- 
did entertainments,  —  drawing-rooms,  balls  given  in  the  new  the- 
atre, built  by  the  architect  Gabriel;  a  representation  of  the  opera 
of"  Persee,"  of  which  certain  details  greatly  amused  the  dauphin- 


PRETENSIONS   OF   PRINCESSES    OF    LORRAINE.         25 

ess;   fireworks;    playing  of  the  fountains;    illuminations  of  the 
grand  canal,  of  the  terrace  and  gardens. 

But  with  these  entertainments  also  began  the  storms  at  court, 
not  less  violent  and  more  treacherous  than  the  storms  of  Heaven. 
At  a  ball  on  the  iQth  the  minuet  danced  by  Mademoiselle  de  Lor- 
raine "  caused  much  discontent."  The  ambassador  from  Austria, 
the  Comte  de  Mercy,  had  asked  the  king  on  the  occasion  of  the 
marriage  of  the  dauphiness  to  show  some  particular  mark  of  dis- 
tinction to  Mademoiselle  Lorraine,  daughter  of  the  Comtesse  de 
Brionne,  and  a  relative  of  the  emperor.  Louis  XV.,  desirous  of 
manifesting  "  his  gratitude  to  the  empress  for  the  present  she 
had  sent  him,"  decided  that  Mademoiselle  Lorraine  should  dance 
the  minuet  immediately  after  the  princes  and  princesses  of  the 
blood.  "  The  choice  of  the  dancers  depending  solely  on  the  will 
of  the  king,  without  regard  to  office,  rank,  or  dignity,"  this  honour 
accorded  the  daughter  of  the  Comtesse  de  Brionne  did  not  entail 
any  consequences,  nor  give  any  pledge  for  the  future.  None  the 
less  it  offended  all  the  nobility.  All  the  noblemen  of  the  court, 
even  the  humblest,  assembled  at  the  house  of  the  bishop  of  Noyon, 
second  ecclesiastical  peer,  in  the  absence  on  business  of  the  first 
peer,  the  archbishop  of  Rheims,  and  drew  up  a  long  memoir  pro- 
testing that  there  could  be  no  intermediate  rank  between  the 
princes  of  the  blood  and  the  haute  noblesse.  The  public  was  very 
much  amused  at  this  quarrel,  and  by  the  fact  that  the  courtiers 
should  assemble  under  the  leadership  of  a  bishop  to  deliberate 
gravely  on  the  serious  question  of  a  minuet.  Some  one  paro- 
died the  memoir  of  the  noblesse  in  these  witty  verses,  which  ran 
over  Paris :  — 

"  Sire,  the  nobles  of  your  State 
Will  see  with  greatest  pain 
A  princess  of  Lorraine 
Precedence  o'er  them  arrogate. 
If  your  Majesty  hath  planned 
Thus  to  slight  a  faithful  band, 
We  shall  quit  our  lady's  tresses, 
Shall  desert  the  violin. 
Consider  well :  our  seal  we  've  set. 
Signed  :  Bishop  of  Noyon, 
La  Vaupaliere,  Bauffremont, 
Clermont,  Laval,  and  De  Villette." 

Louis  XV.  persisted.  On  the  day  of  the  ball  the  ladies  who 
had  been  named  for  the  dance  made  a  point  of  traversing  the 


26  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

apartments  of  Versailles  in  undress ;  in  the  evening  at  five  o'clock, 
the  hour  appointed,  only  three  ladies  were  in  the  salon.  It  took 
a  formal  command  from  the  king  to  force  the  others  to  appear. 
The  entertainment  was  carried  out  in  the  manner  determined  upon, 
but  not  without  a  profound  discontent ;  and  of  all  the  magnificence 
displayed  at  Versailles  to  celebrate  the  marriage  of  the  dauphiness 
there  remained  but  wounded  vanity  and  a  witticism:  "  How  do 
you  find  my  entertainments?"  Louis  XV.  asked  of  the  Abbe 
Terray.  "  Ah,  Sire,  no  money  can  pay  for  them  !  "  answered  the 
comptroller-general. 

But  what  were  these  court  intrigues  beside  the  catastrophe 
which  two  weeks  later  was  to  plunge  the  capital  into  mourning? 

On  the  3Oth  of  May  the  city  of  Paris  in  its  turn  celebrated  by 
public  rejoicings  the  marriage  of  the  dauphiness.  The  celebra- 
tion was  to  be  crowned  by  fireworks  on  the  Place  Louis  XV. 
facing  the  entrance  of  the  Rue  Royale,  and  by  an  illumination 
of  the  colonnades  round  the  square.  The  preparations  promised 
well.  The  principal  decoration,  in  front  of  the  statue  of  Louis 
XV.,  represented  the  temple  of  Hymen;  at  the  four  corners 
four  dolphins  were  to  pour  forth  fountains  of  fire,  and  at  the  four 
fagades  four  streams  were  to  fall  in  cascades  of  flame.  A  building 
placed  behind  the  statue  held  the  reserve  of  fireworks. 

Unfortunately,  in  consequence  of  a  conflict  of  jurisdiction,  the 
superintendence  of  the  celebration  was  not  intrusted  to  the  lieu- 
tenant of  the  police,  Sartines,  but  to  the  provost  of  the  mer- 
chants, Bignon.  Owing  to  lack  of  experience  or  capacity,  Bignon 
neglected  to  take  the  necessary  precautions.  The  display  of 
fireworks,  instead  of  facing  toward  the  Place  Louis  XV.,  which 
could  have  held  a  large  number  of  spectators,  was  turned  toward 
the  Rue  Royale,  then  in  process  of  construction,  where  the  heaps 
of  materials  and  the  ditches  excavated  for  the  sewerage  obstructed 
the  traffic.  No  rules  had  been  published  for  the  circulation  of 
the  carriages;  and  finally,  the  garden  of  the  Tuileries,  through 
which  the  crowd  might  have  passed,  had  been  closed  at  the 
usual  hour. 

The  fireworks  would  not  go  off;  was  it  a  presage?  A  fuse,  care- 
lessly applied,  ignited  the  bouquet  before  the  time;  the  principal 
pieces  failed.  When  all  was  finished,  the  people,  who  filled  the 
Place  Louis  XV.  and  the  Rue  Royale,  began  to  move.  Two 
streams  were  formed,  —  one  seeking  to  gain  the  square  to  see  the 
illumination  of  the  colonnades,  and  to  partake  of  the  fountains  of 


CATASTROPHE   ON    LA   PLACE    LOUIS   XV.  27 

wine  which  had  been  running  since  seven  o'clock;  the  other 
forcing  its  way  through  the  Rue  Royale  to  visit  the  fair,  which 
was  held  along  the  boulevards.  These  two  currents,  advancing 
in  opposite  directions,  blocked  each  other,  and  neither  wished  to 
give  way.  The  crowds  pressing  from  behind  pushed  and  smoth- 
ered those  who  were  in  front ;  the  confusion  was  indescribable. 

The  police  were  not  there.  The  gardes  de  ville,  insufficient  in 
number,  made  vain  efforts  to  establish  order;  but  what  could  a 
handful  of  men  do  against  that  compact  mass  of  people,  who 
pressed  forward  and  would  listen  to  nothing?  The  cries  of  some 
persons,  who  were  being  crushed  or  robbed  by  the  scamps  who 
swarmed  in  the  crowd,  augmented  the  tumult.  To  crown  the 
evil,  the  reserve  of  fireworks  and  the  scaffolding  round  the  statue 
of  the  king  caught  fire.  The  firemen,  with  their  big  horses  and 
heavy  machines,  hurried  to  the  scene  of  the  conflagration,  forcing 
aside  with  violence  the  people  massed  in  the  Rue  Royale,  which 
was  like  a  funnel  already  obstructed;  carriages  in  search  of  their 
masters  sought  to  pass  in  the  wake  made  by  the  engines.  Some 
spectators,  half  crushed,  took  sword  in  hand  to  liberate  them- 
selves ;  some  pickpockets  threw  themselves  into  the  squabble 
to  take  advantage  of  it,  and  increased  the  panic.  The  cries  of 
women  and  children,  who  were  being  suffocated,  the  noise  of 
horses,  the  oaths  of  the  coachmen,  the  red  light  of  the  conflagra- 
tion, —  all  contributed  to  spread  terror  through  the  crowd,  who 
felt  themselves  perishing  without  being  able  to  do  anything  to  save 
themselves.  Woe  to  him  who  fell !  he  was  immediately  trampled 
to  death.  The  crowd,  mad  with  fear  and  unable  to  resist  the 
pressure  from  behind,  sought  to  throw  itself  to  one  side;  the 
people  fell  into  the  ditches  which  the  authorities  had  neglected  to 
cover  over.  The  crowd  precipitated  itself  into  these  yawning 
sepulchres,  —  each  human  wave  swallowing  up  the  one  that  had 
preceded  it,  and  being  swallowed  up  in  its  turn,  amid  the  shrieks 
of  the  dying  and  the  cries  of  the  wounded.  It  was  a  horrible 
sight. 

When  a  reinforcement  of  the  guard,  called  at  the  last  moment, 
finally  succeeded  in  establishing  order,  it  was  too  late.  They  re- 
moved one  hundred  and  thirty-two  corpses  and  five  or  six  times 
as  many  wounded,  and  among  them  personages  of  distinction  and 
foreign  ministers.  These  corpses,  ranged  along  the  boulevard 
like  a  gloomy  decoration,  were  buried  on  the  following  day  in 
the  cemetery  of  the  Madeleine.  Who  could  then  have  foretold 


28  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

that  they  went  there  to  await  the  princess  whose  marriage  had 
been  the  occasion  of  their  death? 

The  dauphiness  was  on  her  way  from  Versailles  with  Mesdames 
to  view  the  illumination  of  the  square,  when  she  heard  of  the 
accident  that  had  just  happened.  She  turned  back,  her  heart 
bursting,  her  eyes  wet.  Despite  the  care  that  was  taken  to  con- 
ceal from  her  the  extent  of  the  catastrophe,  she  could  not  restrain 
her  tears.  "  You  do  not  tell  me  all !"  she  kept  repeating.  "How 
many  victims  !  "  And  when  to  lessen  her  regrets,  they  told  her 
that  among  the  corpses  many  thieves  had  been  taken  whose 
pockets  were  full  of  stolen  valuables,  "  Yes,"  she  answered;  "  but 
they  perished  by  the  side  of  honest  men." 

She  sent  her  purse  immediately  to  Monsieur  de  Sartines  to  suc- 
cour the  families  of  the  victims  ;  the  dauphin  also  sent  his.  He 
awaited,  with  an  .impatience  which  was  not  habitual  to  him,  the 
moment  when  his  month's  allowance  should  be  paid  him ;  as 
soon  as  he  received  it,  he  hastened  to  forward  the  six  thousand 
livres  which  was  the  amount  of  it  to  the  lieutenant  of  the  police, 
with  the  following  note :  — 

I  have  learned  of  the  accident  which  happened  in  Paris,  and  for  which 
I  am  responsible  ;  I  am  deeply  distressed.  They  have  brought  me  what 
the  king  allows  me  every  month  for  pocket-money ;  I  can  dispose  of  only 
that,  and  I  send  it  to  you.  Succour  the  most  unfortunate. 

I  have  great  esteem,  Monsieur,  for  you, 

Louis  AUGUSTE. 


CHAPTER    III. 

THE  ROYAL  FAMILY  IN  1770.  —  THE  KING.  —  MESDAMES.  —  THE  COMTE 
DE  PROVENCE.  —  THE  COMTE  D'ARTOIS.  —  MESDAMES  CLOTILDE  AND 
ELISABETH.  —  THE  DAUPHIN. 

WHAT,  then,  was  this  royal  family  like,  —  the  highest  in 
the  world  at  the  time  that  Marie  Antoinette  entered 
it  under  auspices  so  brilliant  and  yet  so  gloomy? 

The  head  of  the  family  —  the  king,  Louis  XV.  —  was  better 
than  his  reputation,  and,  above  all,  better  than  his  conduct.  His 
secret  correspondence,  now  made  public,  shows  that  he  was  at 
bottom  more  anxious  for  the  honour  and  glory  of  France  than 
he  appeared.  At  one  time  he  even  had  the  desire  to  govern  it 
himself;  but  this  noble  and  fleeting  aspiration  was  soon  stifled 
by  the  indolence  of  his  mind,  his  distrust  of  himself,  his  taste  for 
frivolity,  and  the  domination  of  his  mistresses. 

Of  a  contradictory  character,  he  possessed  at  the  same  time 
noble  qualities  and  vulgar  instincts,  generous  aspirations  and 
selfish  desires.  In  his  youth  he  had  shown  great  promise,  —  a 
quick  intelligence,  an  attentive  mind,  an  extraordinary  memory, 
precocious  reason,  a  keen  and  true  discernment,  a  heart  easy  to 
move.  The  bad  instruction  of  Villery,  instead  of  developing  these 
precious  germs,  destroyed  them ;  from  a  gentle  and  good  child, 
he  became  a  self-willed,  timid,  and  awkward  one,  and  soon  a 
youth  deceitful  and  uninterested.  Ennui,  that  was  the  canker 
which  during  fifty  years  devoured  the  heart  of  Louis  XV.;  it  was 
often  also  the  reason  of  his  excess.  He  might  have  escaped 
from  it  through  a  noble  passion  for  public  affairs ;  the  Cardinal 
de  Fleury  would  not  permit  it.  The  old  minister,  in  order  the 
better  to  strengthen  his  own  power,  cultivated  in  his  royal  pupil  a 
taste  for  frivolous  things  and  for  futile  distractions.  He  made  of 
him  what  he  remained  all  his  life,  —  "an  infant  from  his  head  to 
his  heels,  always  ten  years  behind  his  age,"  according  to  the  say- 
ing of  the  regent.  Thenceforward  the  young  prince  no  longer 


30  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

belonged  to  himself,  but  to  him,  or  rather  to  her,  who  could  best 
amuse  him. 

Louis  XV.  had  inherited  from  his  family  great  physical  beauty, 
in  which  the  majesty  of  his  grandfather,  Louis  XIV.,  was  subdued 
by  the  grace  of  his  mother,  the  charming  and  lively  Duchesse  de 
Bourgogne.  Despite  this  beauty,  despite  a  dangerous  precocity 
and  the  temptations  of  the  ladies  of  the  court,  whose  easy  virtue 
would  willingly  have  succumbed  to  so  brilliant  and  profitable  a 
fall,  he  remained  chaste  up  to  the  age  of  twenty.  As  compensa- 
tion for  the  lack  of  stronger  qualities  and  discipline,  his  preceptor 
had  at  least  inculcated  religious  principles  which  for  a  time  held 
the  ardour  of  his  senses  in  check.  Unfortunately  his  temptations 
were  more  lasting  than  his  firmness ;  and  the  first  step  once  made 
along  the  path  of  culpable  pleasures,  Louis  XV.,  despite  certain 
feeble  desires  to  return,  could  not  stop  himself.  From  Madame 
de  Mailly  he  passed  to  Madame  de  Vintimille,  from  Madame  de 
Vintimille  to  the  Duchesse  de  Chateauroux,  from  the  Duchesse 
de  Chateauroux  to  Madame  de  Pompadour  and  to  the  fugitive 
beauties  of  the  Parc-aux-Cerfs.  After  the  death  of  the  dauphin 
and  dauphiness,  struck  by  this  double  blow  from  Heaven,  he  wished 
to  retire  within  himself  and  break  the  chains  that  so  shamefully 
bound  him.  Later  he  even  contemplated  a  second  marriage  with 
the  Princesse  de  Lamballe,  it  was  said,  then  with  one  of  the  daugh- 
ters of  Maria  Theresa,  the  Archduchess  Elisabeth.  An  odious 
court  intrigue  dissipated  these  good  intentions,  and  threw  the  old 
king,  half  repentant,  into  the  arms  of  a  courtesan  of  low  birth,  — 
"the  vile  remnant  of  public  license,"  as  the  Abbe  de  Beauvais  dared 
to  say  from  the  pulpit  of  Versailles.  Whatever  the  weak  monarch 
still  possessed  of  virility  perished  in  that  shameful  bond.  The  bril- 
liant conqueror  of  Fontenay  became  but  the  humble  slave  of  the 
Du  Barry,  enduring  without  a  murmur  her  gross  pleasantries  and 
her  grotesque  nicknames,  lending  himself  to  her  most  ridiculous 
caprices,  and  but  too  happy  to  satisfy  her  luxurious  fancies.  The 
prince  in  whom  D'Argenson  had  hailed  a  veritable  talent  for  gov- 
ernment, humanity,  justice,  good  sense,  an  interest  in  affairs,  a 
taste  for  economy,  had  grown  to  be  an  old  man,  sated,  nonchalant, 
hating  all  work  and  all  constraint,  a  good-for-nothing  king  in  the 
literal  sense  of  the  term,  —  dividing  his  life  between  the  hunt  and 
small  suppers  in  the  petites  maisons,  with  no  taste  for  aught  but 
the  pctits  cancans  of  the  court,  rude  anecdotes,  and  low  conver- 
sation ;  lavishing  money  recklessly  on  his  mistress,  with  no  con- 


MESDAMES.  31 


ccrn  for  the  future  of  his  kingdom  nor  the  complaints  of  his 
subjects ;  clever  enough  to  perceive  the  abuses ;  too  indifferent  to 
seek  to  remedy  them,  remarking  cynically  to  one  of  his  courtiers, 
"  Things  as  they  are  will  last  my  time." 

And  as  a  just  reward,  in  proportion  as  the  king  withdrew  from 
his  subjects,  his  people  withdrew  from  him;  and  the  acclama- 
tions which  had  greeted  his  youth  were  changed  to  murmurs  and 
"  fanatical  discontent."  France,  who,  as  Michelet  said,  had  loved 
the  child  with  the  devotion  of  mother,  mistress,  and  nurse,  had  no 
longer  any  feeling  for  him  but  that  of  anger  and  dissatisfaction,  — 
anger  and  dissatisfaction  the  more  intense  because  her  hopes  had 
been  great  and  her  tenderness  long-suffering.  Louis  XV.  the 
Well-beloved  had  become  Louis  XV.  the  Well-hated. 

\Yith  the  king  lived  his  daughters,  Madame  Adelaide,  Madame 
Victoire,  Madame  Sophie,  truly  pious  princesses,  but  of  a  narrow- 
minded  piety  that  knew  not  how  to  make  itself  lovely.  Their 
exterior  was  without  grace.  Walpole,  who  saw  them  on  his  pres- 
entation at  the  court  of  France,  describes  them  as  "  clumsy, 
plump  old  wenches,  awkward  in  their  bearing,  confused  in  their 
manner,  not  knowing  what  to  do  or  say."  As  they  held  them- 
selves very  much  aloof,  being  embarrassed  whenever  it  was 
necessary  to  appear  in  public,  and  timid  even  with  their  father, 
notwithstanding  the  fact  that  he  treated  them  familiarly,  neglect- 
ing the  court  and  neglected  by  it,  they  never  knew  how  to  ac- 
quire the  influence  which  their  birth,  it  would  seem,  should 
have  assured  to  them,  and  which  Louis  XV.  on  their  return 
from  Fontrcvault,  where  they  received  their  education,  for  the 
most  part  sufficiently  neglected,  seemed  inclined  to  let  them 
have.  After  the  advent  of  the  Du  Barry  they  lived  more  retired 
•than  ever,  occupying  themselves  with  their  music  and  horojogy, 
resolutely  hostile  to  the  favourite,  whom  they  despised  pro- 
foundly and  with  just  cause,  taking  part  secretly  in  underhand 
intrigues,  and  the  more  jealous  of  the  appearance  of  consequence 
insomuch  as  they  lacked  the  reality. 

They  were  not,  however,  old  women,  —  the  oldest  was  but 
thirty-eight;  but  they  were  already  old  maids,  with  the  easily 
wounded  susceptibilities,  the  narrowness  of  mind,  the  instinct 
to  rule,  the  timidity,  the  indirect  methods,  the  little  deceits,  the 
jealousies,  and  the  backbiting  characteristic  of  that  state. 

Madame  Adelaide,  the  oldest  of  the  three  sisters,  and  also  the 
most  able,  had  brusque  manners,  a  rough  voice,  a  curt  pronuncia- 


32  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

tion,  a  certain  masculine  air  which  was  not  attractive.  With  a 
very  exalted  idea  of  the  prerogatives  of  her  rank,  she  suffered 
extremely  from  the  insignificance  to  which  she  found  herself 
reduced.  Her  mind,  active,  determined,  and  haughty,  would 
gladly  have  aspired  to  an  important  role ;  but  her  talents  not 
being  great  enough  to  support  her  pretensions,  she  avenged  her- 
self for  the  effacement  which  mortified  her  by  small  machinations 
and  malice.  Hostile  to  any  alliance  with  the  Hapsburgs,  she 
could  not  pardon  her  new  niece  the  blood  which  ran  in  her  veins. 
Monseiur  Campan,  on  his  departure  with  the  household  of  the 
dauphiness  to  receive  her  at  the  frontier,  had  presented  himself 
at  the  apartment  of  the  old  princess  to  ask  if  she  had  any  com- 
mands. "  If  I  had  any  orders  to  give,"  she  replied  dryly,  "  they 
would  not  be  to  send  for  an  Austrian." 

More  amiable  than  her  sister,  Madame  Victoire  was  also  more 
lovable ;  her  household  adored  her.  All  those  who  came  in  con- 
tact with  her  were  attracted  by  her  unvarying  kindliness,  instinctive 
rather  than  the  result  of  thought,  but  profound;  she  loved  to  give 
pleasure.  Her  early  stoutness  gained  for  her  on  the  part  of  the  king 
—  who,  by  force  of  living  with  people  of  low  condition,  finished  by 
acquiring  their  language  —  a  grotesque  surname ;  and  malicious 
tongues  declared  that  this  corpulence  of  the  princess  was  the  effect 
of  the  savoury  dishes  which  her  mattre  d'kdtel  served  to  her.  She 
herself  made  no  mystery  of  her  tastes ;  she  avowed  with  a  sweet 
simplicity  her  fondness  for  good  cheer  and  the  luxuries  of  life. 
"  Here  is  an  armchair  which  will  be  my  destruction,"  she  said 
one  day  to  Madame  Campan.  Of  an  apathetic  nature,  she  suc- 
cumbed to  the  ascendancy  of  her  older  sister,  and  allowed  her 
to  drag  her  into  all  sorts  of  malicious  animosities  which  her 
heart*often  disavowed,  but  which  her  weak  good-nature  could 
not  protest  against. 

Madame  Sophie  came  between  these  two  sisters  ;  she  was  with- 
out wit  as  without  grace,  always  timid,  flurried,  silent,  and  morose, 
never  opening  her  lips  save  when  there  was  a  storm,  nor  her  eyes 
but  to  look  out  of  the  corners  of  them  like  a  hare,  and  counted 
for  nothing  at  the  court;  she  was  but  a  minor  satellite  that  re- 
volved docilely  and  blindly  round  Madame  Ad^laYde. 

Finally  Madame  Louise,  Madame  Derntere,  as  Louis  XV.  had 
called  her  at  her  birth,  —  Madame  Louise,  after  having  shared  the 
life  of  her  sisters  for  twenty  years,  had  suddenly  a  month  before 
renounced  all  the  pomps  of  the  court  and  all  the  luxuries  of  life, 


THE   DAUPHIN.  33 


to  which  she  was,  however,  by  no  means  insensible.  One  day, 
the  iith  of  April,  17/0,  at  seven  o'clock  in  the  morning,  she  left 
Versailles  without  informing  any  one  but  her  father,  impelled  by 
a  sudden  determination  to  put  into  execution  an  aspiration  which 
she  had  cherished  for  eighteen  years,  and  accompanied  by  only  one 
lady  and  equerry,  betook  herself  to  the  convent  of  the  Carmelites 
at  St.  Denys,  —  the  poorest  of  the  order.  The  gates  closed  upon 
her;  the  daughter  of  France  became  the  Mother  Therese  of 
St.  Augustin.  The  court  was  stupefied ;  Mesdames  seized  with 
consternation.  The  king,  in  whom  the  heroic  and  unexpected 
resolution  of  Madame  Louise  awoke  for  a  time,  alas  !  too  short,  the 
faith  of  his  childhood,  and  who  wrote  letters  to  her  wherein  he 
spoke  as  an  affectionate  father  and  a  believing  Christian,  —  the 
king,  though  for  a  while  disturbed  in  his  habits  by  not  finding 
Madame  Derniere  with  her  sisters  when  he  descended  to  take  his 
coffee  with  them,  soon  resumed  his  old  life,  which  his  daughter 
was  to  expiate  amid  the  austerities  of  the  cloister. 

Determined  to  make  her  sacrifice  complete,  the  princess  would 
allow  no  relaxation  of  the  rule,  accepting  the  severest  mortifica- 
tions and  the  most  humiliating  labours  like  the  least  novice. 
Unfortunately  the  turmoil  of  the  world  did  not  always  die  away 
at  the  gates  of  the  convent  at  St.  Denys.  Mother  Therese  of 
St.  Augustin  remembered  more  than  once  that  she  was  the 
daughter  and  the  aunt  of  a  king,  and  lent  the  authority  of  her 
voice  and  of  her  holy  life  to  the  political  passions  of  her  sisters 
and  to  their  aspersions  of  their  young  niece,  from  whose  hands, 
however,  she  had  received  the  veil. 

As  to  the  brothers  and  sisters  of  the  dauphin,  the  Comte  de 
Provence  was  possessed  of  a  keen  and  cultivated  mind,  but  was 
of  doubtful  character;  the  Comte  d'Artois  was  a  brilliant  trifler, 
with  no  thought  but  for  his  pleasures;  Mesdames  Clotilde  and 
Elisabeth,  still  in  the  hands  of  their  governess,  the  Comtesse  de 
Marsan,  were  too  young  to  have  any  past,  and  it  was  uncertain 
whether  they  were  to  have  a  future ;  they  hardly  counted  at  the 
court,  and  we  hear  nothing  of  them  till  later. 

But  the  dauphin  himself,  whose  destiny  Marie  Antoinette  was 
to  share,— what  was  he?  What  was  his  character?  Who  had 
formed  it?  What  might  be  argued  from  it  in  that  solemn  hour, 
when  the  future  of  a  whole  life  might  depend  on  the  first  contact 
of  two  hearts  that  were  to  be  united  by  the  most  indissoluble  of 
all  ties? 

VOL.  i.  —  3 


34  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Louis  Auguste,  Due  de  Berry,  third  son  of  the  dauphin,  son  of 
Louis  XV.  and  of  Marie  Josephe  of  Saxe,  was  born  on  Aug.  23, 
1754.  His  birth,  which  took  place  unexpectedly  at  Versailles 
while  the  court  was  at  Choisy,  was  not  surrounded  by  all  the 
solemn  ceremony  customary  at  the  birth  of  Children  of  France; 
and  the  courier  charged  to  carry  the  news  to  the  king  was 
thrown  from  his  horse  and  killed.  Superstitious  imaginations 
were  struck  by  this  sad  incident,  and  the  saying  spread  among 
the  people  that  "  the  new  prince  was  not  born  to  luck." 

The  health  of  the  Due  de  Berry  was  delicate.  His  governess, 
the  Comtesse  de  Marsan,  nee  Rohan-Soubise,  carried  him  to  the 
country,  to  Bellevue.  There  the  fresh  air,  exercise,  and  intelli- 
gent care  soon  triumphed  over  his  original  weakness.  Under 
these  fortifying  influences,  the  temperament  of  the  young  prince 
acquired  a  vigour  which  it  was  never  to  lose ;  and  when  in  the 
month  of  September,  1760,  he  was  put  into  the  hands  of  men, 
the  dauphiness  could  well  praise  his  robust  appearance,  in  the 
same  letter,  alas !  in  which  she  was  obliged  to  acknowledge  the 
growing  feebleness  of  her  oldest  son,  the  Due  de  Bourgogne. 
Six  months  later,  on  the  22d  of  March,  1761,  the  Due  de  Bour- 
gogne died,  and  the  Due  de  Berry  became  heir-presumptive  to 
the  throne. 

The  governor  of  the  Children  of  France  was  the  Due  de  la 
Vauguyon,  a  brave  soldier,  but  of  a  narrow  and  vain  mind.  Not 
understanding  that  the  dauphin,  once  married,  was  his  own  mas- 
ter, he  sought  to  impose  his  supervision  over  the  intimacy  of  the 
young  couple,  and  being  defeated  in  his  calculation  by  the  firm- 
ness of  Marie  Antoinette,  tried  wickedly  to  separate  those  whom 
he  could  not  rule.  The  under-governor  was  the  Marquis  de 
Sinety;  the  preceptor,  Monseigneur  de  Coetlosquet,  bishop  of 
Limoges ;  the  under-preceptor  was  the  Abb6  de  Radonvilliers, 
whose  post  was  perhaps  the  most  important,  as  it  brought  him 
into  daily  contact  with  his  pupil,  and  whose  influence  was  the 
most  lasting,  for  twenty  years  later  Necker  accused  him  of  gov- 
erning France.  He  was  a  man  of  "subtle  and  shrewd  under- 
standing," according  to  the  charge"  d'affaires  of  Prussia.  But  the 
dauphin  and  dauphiness  reserved  the  superintendence  of  their 
children's  education  for  themselves.  Unfortunately  their  enlight- 
ened direction  did  not  long  continue.  The  dauphin  was  carried 
away  on  the  2Oth  of  December,  1765;  the  dauphiness  followed 
him  to  the  grave  on  the  I3th  of  March,  1767.  The  Due  de  la 


Louis  XYL 


THE    DAUPHIN.  35 


Vauguyon  alone  remained  in  charge  of  the  education  of  the  heir 
to  the  crown. 

The  instruction  of  the  young  prince  was  serious  and  solid. 
His  father  had  insisted  that  he  should  not  be  taught  by  play,  as 
certain  philosophers  recommended  at  that  time,  but  by  serious 
and  sustained  application.  Even  after  the  death  of  the  dauphin, 
these  severe  precepts  were  observed.  Thanks  to  them,  the  mind 
of  the  Due  de  Berry  was  furnished  with  useful  and  varied  accom- 
plishments. He  knew  Latin  literature  so  thoroughly  as  to  be  able 
to  discuss  in  an  hour  sadly  solemn  the  respective  merits  of  Livy 
and  Tacitus;  he  understood  Italian,  spoke  German  fairly,  and 
knew  English  sufficiently  well  to  translate  various  works.  By  a 
singular  choice,  which  one  might  regard  as  an  omen,  his  first 
translation  was  of  the  History  of  Charles  I.  by  Hume. 

Here  also  he  displayed  his  taste  for  history,  which  was  his 
favourite  study,  and  had  no  rival  save  perhaps  in  his  fondness 
for  geography.  He  was  master  of  this  latter  science.  To  draw 
maps,  to  trace  a  map  of  the  world,  to  construct  the  terrestrial 
sphere,  —  this  was  his  pleasure ;  and  we  know  that  later  it  was  he 
who  prepared  with  his  own  hands  instructions  for  the  illustrious 
and  unfortunate  La  Perouse,  when  he  started-on  his  great  voyage 
round  the  world,  from  which  he  never  returned. 

The  care  for  his  education  kept  pace  with  that  for  his  studies ; 
but  in  the  former  the  direction  was  not  so  fortunate,  nor  the 
result  so  satisfactory.  If  the  preceptors  of  the  young  prince  in- 
culcated in  him  a  true  and  profound  piety,  a  steadfast  attachment 
to  the  Catholic  faith,  a  purity  of  mind  that  could  withstand  the 
temptations  of  a  corrupt  court,  they  knew  not  how  to  subjoin  to 
these  virtues,  which  are  the  proper  heritage  of  all  mankind, 
those  more  especially  suited  to  a  sovereign.  They  neglected  to 
teach  him  that  a  monarch  should  not  only  mete  out  justice,  but 
that  he  should  wield  the  truncheon  of  the  commander;  and  that 
he  should  know  how,  if  need  be,  to  draw  his  sword.  They  made 
of  him  a  saint;  they  failed  utterly  in  making  of  him  a  king. 

Of  an  intense  nature,  but  somewhat  lacking  in  energy,  sluggish 
and  undecided  in  character,  and  shut  up  within  himself,  the  Due 
de  Berry  had  many  good  qualities,  but  few  that  were  lovable  or 
strong.  With  his  natural  integrity,  his  admirable  uprightness, 
his  strong  sense  of  justice,  his  ardent  love  for  the  people,  he 
lacked  that  firmness  which  is  imposing,  and  that  outward  charm 
and  tact  which  pleases.  Although  he  possessed  in  his  whole 


36  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

figure  that  air  of  dignity  which  the  Bourbons  never  lost,  and 
which  his  portraits  plainly  show;  and  while  under  impressive  cir- 
cumstances and  on  days  of  public  ceremony  one  was  struck  by 
the  majesty  of  his  appearance,  —  nevertheless  in  ordinary  life 
his  step  was  heavy,  his  figure  thick,  his  speech  rude.  His  good- 
nature too  often  degenerated  into  weakness,  his  frankness  into 
brusqueness,  his  raillery  into  sharpness.  He  should  have  come 
in  contact  with  the  world  to  have  laid  a  solid  foundation  for  the 
talents  God  had  given  him,  —  to  have  acquired  the  form  which 
he  lacked,  that  polish  of  ease  and  affability  so  necessary  to  a 
prince  destined  to  live  in  the  midst  of  the  most  polite  society  and 
on  the  first  throne  of  the  world,  and  to  have  gained  at  the  same 
time  that  knowledge  of  men  and  things  without  which  no  king 
can  conduct  himself  or  his  kingdom. 

Instead  of  this,  he  was  shut  up  in  the  most  complete  isolation. 
His  father  and  mother,  justly  indignant  at  the  scandals  of  the  court, 
had  made  it  a  rule  to  live  in  retirement,  and  there  to  educate  their 
children.  After  their  death  this  tradition  was  too  religiously  re- 
spected. It  developed  in  the  young  prince  what  are  excellent 
qualities  when  confined  within  certain  limitations,  but  which  when 
carried  too  far  become  faults.  It  made  him  timid,  awkward,  dis- 
trustful of  himself,  "  untamed,"  as  Louis  XV.  said.  "  His  mind 
insensibly  contracted  a  habit  of  such  exaggerated  modesty,"  one 
historian  wrote,  "  that  he  often  sacrificed  his  own  opinions  to  the 
most  mediocre  counsels."  Surrounded  by  his  brothers,  whose 
talents,  if  less  substantial,  were  more  brilliant,  the  Due  de  Berry, 
become  dauphin,  saw  the  courtiers  withdraw  from  him,  and  pay 
their  homage  to  the  Comte  de  Provence  or  to  the  Comte  d'Artois. 
This  disturbed  him,  and  rendered  him  more  irresolute  than  ever. 
His  heart,  wounded  by  these  marks  of  disdain,  or  at  least  of  in- 
difference, could  not  suppress  a  secret  feeling  of  bitterness;  and 
one  day,  when  an  orator  from  the  country  was  complimenting  him 
on  his  precocity,  he  replied:  "You  mistake,  Monsieur.  Tis  not 
I  who  am  clever ;  't  is  my  brother,  De  Provence." 

Deserted  by  the  courtiers  and  neglected  by  the  king,  the 
dauphin  buried  himself  in  his  solitary  studies  and  manual  labours. 
His  robust  physique  had  need  of  muscular  exercise ;  he  had  a 
tower  built,  and  organized  workshops  for  carpentry  and  lock- 
smith's work.  It  was  in  occupations  of  this  sort  that  he  passed 
the  hours  not  given  up  to  his  studies  or  to  the  chase.  The  chase 
and  the  forge  were  his  two  favourite  pastimes,  one  might  almost 


THE    DAUPHIN.  37 


say  his  two  passions.  He  had  a  third,  even  greater, —  the  passion 
for  doing  good  ;  unfortunately  he  had  no  knowledge  of  how  to 
do  it.  His  life,  isolated  and  thoughtful,  might  well  have  made 
him  conceive  a  horror  of  the  abuses  he  saw  in  the  government, 
and  inspired  him  with  an  ardent  desire  to  correct  them,  but  it  was 
not  able  to  give  him  that  experience  of  the  world  without  which 
one  acts  at  venture,  nor  that  energetic  decision  without  which 
one  falls  into  error. 

With  his  retired  habits,  his  cold  and  self-contained  nature,  his 
close  reserve,  it  was  impossible  for  the  dauphin  to  be  a  wise 
director  for  the  young  wife  confided  to  his  care,  nor  a  very  affec- 
tionate husband.  "  He  is  not  like  other  men,"  his  grandfather 
said  of  him.  Only  a  few  days  after  his  marriage,  on  the  23d  of 
May,  he  said  to  the  dauphiness,  on  entering  her  room  in  the 
morning,  "  Have  you  slept  well?  "  to  which  Marie  Antoinette  re- 
plied, "  Yes ;  "  and  the  interview  of  husband  and  wife,  then  in  their 
full  honeymoon,  limited  itself  to  this  brief  exchange  of  words. 

The  poor  dauphiness,  whose  tender  and  loving  heart  only 
asked  to  be  repaid  in  kind,  was  quite  chagrined  by  his  coldness, 
which  she  could  not  understand.  Her  husband  had  indeed  de- 
clared to  his  aunts  that  he  had  found  her  very  amiable,  and  was 
pleased  with  her ;  she  would  have  liked  it  better  had  he  kept  his 
satisfaction  less  shut  up  within  himself;  she  felt  sad  and  home- 
sick at  that  court,  where  she  found  no  demonstrative  affection  in 
response  to  hers,  nor  support  for  her  first  steps.  She  tried  vainly 
to  conquer  the  melancholy  which  took  possession  of  her ;  her 
mind,  if  for  a  moment  diverted,  soon  returned  to  its  gloomy  re- 
flections, and  fell  again  into  revery.  "  My  heart  aches  for  her," 
Vermond  wrote. 


CHAPTER    IV. 

INTRIGUES  AT   COURT.  —  RIVAL   PARTIES.  —  ESPIONAGE  OF  THE   Due 

DE  LA  VAUGUYON. —  THE  SUCCESSFUL  DEBUT  OF  THE  DAUPHINESS. 

-  THE   COMTESSE  DE   GRAMONT.  —  ONE  OF   MARIE  ANTOINETTE'S 

DAYS  ;   HER  READING.  —  COUNSELS   OF   MARIA   THERESA.  —  AFTER 

SOME  RESISTANCE  THE  DAUPHINESS  FOLLOWS  THEM. 

RARELY,  we  believe,  was  a  court  more  divided,  more  given  up 
to  factions,  to  underhand  manoeuvres,  to  envy  and  malice, 
than  was  the  court  of  France  in  1770.  Two  parties  struggled  for 
power:  one,  which  was  the  party  in  the  ascendant  at  that  epoch, 
was  called  the  Choiseul  party,  and  had  at  its  head  the  minister 
who  had  strengthened  the  Austrian  alliance,  and  concluded  the 
marriage  of  the  dauphin  to  Marie  Antoinette.  He  had  with  him 
public  opinion,  the  Parliaments,  or  at  least  the  Parliamentarians. 
The  other,  which  was  called  the  party  of  de'vots,  —  though  in  real- 
ity the  majority  of  those  who  composed  it  cared  very  little  about 
religion ;  but  they  had  gathered  about  them  all  who  resented  Choi- 
seul's  expulsion  of  the  Jesuits,  —  had  for  its  heads  the  Chancellor 
Maupeou,  the  Comtesse  de  Marsan,  governess  of  the  Children  of 
France,  who  —  one  must  do  her  that  justice  —  succeeded  in  in- 
spiring her  pupils,  Mesdames  Clotilde  and  Elisabeth,  with  genuine 
sentiments  of  piety,  but  who  was  intriguing  and  vindictive,  and 
who  brought  with  her  the  powerful  family  of  Rohan ;  the  Due 
d'Aiguillon,  the  enemy  of  La  Chalotais,  the  despotic  and  stupid 
governor  of  Bretagne,  who  was  upheld  by  the  entire  influence  of 
the  family  of  Richelieu ;  and  the  Due  de  la  Vauguyon,  the  pre- 
tentious and  mediocre  governor  of  whom  we  have  already  spoken, 
but  whose  office  gave  him  an  importance  at  the  court.  Mesdames, 
in  memory  of  their  brother  and  out  of  hatred  for  Choiseul,  inclined 
toward  the  second  party ;  and  the  ambitious  Maupeou  had  also 
succeeded  in  enlisting  Madame  du  Barry,  who  could  not  forgive 
the  minister  for  the  proud  independence  with  which  he  treated 
her. 


ESPIONAGE   OF   THE    DUG    DE    LA   VAUGUYON.          39 

Between  these  two  principal  factions  which  divided  the  court 
Were  numerous  minor  ambitions,  petty  spites,  vulgar  and  often- 
times shameful  passions.  It  is  not  for  us  to  delineate  here  a  pic- 
ture of  French  society  during  the  latter  part  of  the  reign  of  Louis 
XV. ;  the  traits  of  it  are  well  known,  and  are  found  in  every 
chronicle  of  the  time.  But  it  was  a  sad  spectacle  for  a  child  of  fif- 
teen, chaste  and  pure,  —  that  world  of  Versailles,  where  too  often, 
in  accordance  with  the  example  set  by  the  master  and  his  favourite, 
men  had  wives  but  to  desert  them,  and  women  husbands  but  to 
betray  them.  It  was  difficult  to  walk  on  that  slippery  ground, 
and  any  false  step  was  singularly  dangerous.  Whatever  may  have 
been  Marie  Antoinette's  desire  to  hold  aloof  from  political  par- 
ties, it  was  impossible  for  her  to  escape  them.  From  the  moment 
of  her  appearance  she  was  perforce  classed  with  one  or  the  other  of 
the  rival  factions.  Her  gratitude  and  the  counsels  of  her  mother 
placed  her  in  Choiseul's  camp.  This  was  enough  to  mark  her 
for  the  hatred,  cavilling,  and  machinations  of  every  enemy  of 
Choiseul.  Some  sought  to  undermine  her  influence  before  she 
possessed  any ;  others,  who  were  more  adroit,  sought  to  dominate 
her.  Before  Marie  Antoinette  was  a  month  at  Versailles  she  was 
entangled  in  such  a  network  of  intrigues  as  to  be  almost  inextri- 
cable. Everything  furnished  material  for  mischief,  complots, 
conflicts.  It  was  the  Abbe  de  Vermond  whom  they  sought  to 
remove;  it  was  the  Comtesse  de  Noailles  whom  they  tried  to 
estrange  by  a  thousand  vexations.  Then  it  was  a  waiting-woman 
of  doubtful  fidelity  whom  they  wished  to  introduce  into  the  house- 
hold of  the  dauphiness,  or  a  suspected  confessor  whom  they 
tried  to  give  her.  They  made  an  effort  to  prejudice. the  king 
against  her  by  spreading  the  report  that  she  had  refused  to  accom- 
pany him  on  his  journeys.  They  used  their  utmost  endeavours  to 
alienate  her  husband  from  her. 

This  last  task  devolved  upon  the  Due  de  la  Vauguyon.  The 
former  governor,  being  eager  to  preserve  his  ascendancy  over  the 
prince,  whom  he  wished  to  dominate,  and  fearful  of  the  influence 
that  a  fresh  and  charming  young  wife  might  gain  over  that  un- 
spoiled and  virginal  nature,  spared  no  effort  to  separate  husband 
and  wife.  Contrary  to  all  etiquette,  and  despite  the  opposition  of 
the  Comtesse  de  Noailles,  he  claimed  to  have  at  all  hours  and  by 
private  passages  entrance  not  only  to  the  dauphin's  apartment 
but  to  the  dauphiness's.  He  even  went  further.  One  day  Marie 
Antoinette  and  her  husband  were  together  in  their  apartment. 


40  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

A  valet  de  chambre,  who  was  "  either  a  fool  or  a  good  fellow," 
suddenly  threw  open  the  door,  and  they  perceived  Monsieur  de  la 
Vauguyon,  who  had  crept  up  stealthily  to  listen,  and  who  re- 
mained there  rooted  to  the  spot.  Disconcerted  at  being  thus 
detected,  and  unable  to  retreat,  the  duke  found  nothing  to  say 
in  his  defence.  The  dauphiness  took  occasion  to  represent  to 
her  husband  the  inconvenience  of  the  indecent  conduct  of  his 
governor;  and  the  dauphin  took  her  remonstrances  in  good  part, 
feeling  that  they  were  but  too  just. 

Despite  all  these  cabals  and  pitfalls  Marie  Antoinette's  advent 
was  a  success;  we  have  it  from  a  perfectly  unprejudiced  witness, 
a  pamphletaire.  The  king  felt  himself  regenerated  at  the  sight 
of  that  beautiful  and  pure  child,  whose  appearance  at  Versailles, 
where  too  often  virtue  was  dull  and  beauty  licentious,  had  for  a 
moment  cleared  the  atmosphere  of  the  court.  He  remarked  in- 
deed that  she  was  somewhat  gay,  somewhat  childish,  but  that,  he 
immediately  added,  was  but  natural  to  her  age. 

In  reality  he  found  her  charming.  "  I  have  my  Duchesse  de 
Bourgogne  again,"  he  often  said.  The  public  was  charmed 
with  the  affability  of  the  young  princess ;  even  the  oldest  court- 
iers were  enraptured.  Choiseul,  after  a  conversation  with  her, 
was  enthusiastic.  "  I  never  saw  any  one  to  equal  her  at  her  age," 
he  said.  And  the  Due  de  Noailles,  "  the  wittiest  man  in  France, 
and  the  one  who  best  understood  the  sovereign  and  the  court," 
declared  to  Mercy  that  beyond  doubt,  "judging  by  the  qualities 
one  perceived  in  the  princess,  her  charms  would  one  day  gain  an 
all-powerful  influence  over  the  king." 

The  IdWies  of  the  dauphiness  were  not  less  pleased  by  the 
consideration  she  manifested  for  them,  and  the  protection  she 
accorded  them.  One  notable  example  in  the  beginning  showed 
with  what  ardour  and  firmness  she  could  defend  them  on  occasion. 
At  Choisy  during  a  performance  the  ladies  of  the  palace  had  taken 
possession  of  the  front  seats,  and  refused  to  make  room  for  the 
Comtesse  du  Barry  and  two  of  her  intimate  friends.  There  were 
some  very  sharp  remarks  exchanged  ;  the  favourite  complained ; 
and  the  king,  yielding  to  her  plaints,  exiled  one  of  the  ladies  of  the 
dauphiness,  the  Comtesse  de  Gramont,  who  had  been  among 
the  most  outspoken  against  Madame  du  Barry,  to  fifteen  leagues 
from  the  court.  Some  months  later  Madame  de  Gramont,  being 
taken  ill,  requested  permission  to  return  to  Paris,  and  begged 
Marie  Antoinette  to  intercede  in  her  favour.  The  young  princess 


HER   GROWING    INFLUENCE.  41 

immediately  sought  her  grandfather  and  laid  before  him  with 
much  grace  and  sweetness  the  request  of  her  lady-in-waiting. 
The  king,  embarrassed  as  he  always  was  under  similar  circum- 
stances, put  her  off.  The  dauphiness  insisted.  "  Madame,"  re- 
plied Louis  XV.,  rather  dryly,  "  have  I  not  told  you  that  I  should 
give  you  an  answer?"  "But,  Papa,"  the  princess  cried  eagerly, 
"  aside  from  reasons  of  humanity  and  justice,  think  what  grief 
it  would  be  for  me  should  a  lady  attached  to  my  service  die  while 
under  your  displeasure."  The  king  smiled,  and  promised  his 
granddaughter  to  satisfy  her.  He  immediately  charged  the  Due 
de  la  Vrilliere  to  inquire  into  the  condition  of  Madame  de  Gra- 
mont,  and  two  days  later,  despite  the  opposition  of  Madame  du 
Barry,  he  ordered  permission  to  be  sent  to  the  invalid  to  return 
to  Paris.  La  Vrilliere,  who  was  intimately  connected  with  the 
favourite,  sent  the  permission,  but  unwillingly.  Either  from  ill- 
will  or  forgetful  ness,  he  neglected  to  inform  the  dauphiness  of  hav- 
ing done  so.  The  dauphiness  sent  for  him.  "  Monsieur,"  she  said 
to  him  in  a  tone  full  of  dignity,  "  in  dealing  with  a  petition  with 
which  I  had  charged  you,  and  which  concerned  a  lady  in  my  ser- 
vice, I  should  have  been  the  first  to  be  informed,  and  by  you,  of 
the  decision  of  the  king  with  regard  to  it ;  but  I  see,  Monsieur, 
that  you  treat  me  as  though  I  were  a  child,  and  I  am  very  well 
content  to  tell  you  that  I  shall  not  forget  it." 

La  Vrilliere,  confused,  stammered  a  few  poor  excuses.  The 
court  was  surprised  at  her  proud  language  ;  and  Madame  Adelaide, 
admiring  a  courage  of  which  she  would  not  have  been  capable, 
could  not  refrain  from  saying  to  her  niece,  not  perhaps  without  a 
touch  of  envy,  "  'T  is  easy  to  see  that  you  are  not  of  our  race." 

Despite  the  divergence  of  ideas  and  difference  of  attitude, 
Mesdames  themselves  at  that  moment  had  fallen  under  her 
charm ;  and  Madame  Adelaide,  for  an  instant  oblivious  of  her 
prejudices,  gave  Marie  Antoinette  a  key  to  their  apartment,  so 
that  she  might  go  to  them  without  her  suite  and  without  being 
seen.  There  was  no  one,  not  even  excepting  the  dauphin,  who 
did  not  succumb  to  the  ascendancy  of  the  young  woman.  His 
character,  somewhat  reserved  and  self-contained,  began  to  blos- 
som in  contact  with  her  grace  and  good-humour.  "  Since  we 
must  live  together  in  intimate  friendship,"  the  princess  said  to 
him  one  day,  "  we  should  discuss  everything  with  confidence." 
And  their  conversation  began  in  fact  to  be  confidential  and  inti- 
mate, touching  upon  the  most  delicate  subjects, —  upon  Madame 
du  Barry,  and  upon  the  Due  de  Choiseul. 


42  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Such  a  triumph  was  indeed  too  brilliant  to  last,  and  the  faithful 
Mercy,  who  well  knew  the  court  of  Versailles  and  the  French 
character,  was  not  blind  as  to  the  results  of  this  flattering  begin- 
ning. "  Without  allowing  myself  to  be  dazzled  by  the  well-de- 
served success  of  Madame  the  Dauphiness,"  he  wrote  on  the  I5th 
of  June,  1770,  "  I  reflect  that  in  the  midst  of  a  gay  and  inconstant 
nation,  and  in  an  extremely  stormy  court,  it  is  more  easy  to  win 
favour  at  the  start  than  to  preserve  it  for  any  length  of  time." 
There  were  too  many  people  whose  interest  it  was  to  destroy  this 
budding  influence,  and  moreover  the  qualities  of  the  young  prin- 
cess were  too  brilliant  not  to  be  dangerous.  Impulsive,  free  from 
all  calculation  or  ulterior  motive,  she  rarely  was  able  to  hide 
her  feelings,  and  this  very  spontaneity  which  was  one  of  her 
charms  was  also  one  of  her  perils.  Her  ready  confidence  exposed 
her,  unarmed,  to  the  intrigues  of  her  surroundings,  as  her  kind 
heart  left  her  without  defence  against  solicitations  and  importu- 
nities. Lively,  ardent,  full  of  gayety  and  life,  fond  of  pleasure, 
inclined  to  raillery,  it  was  difficult  for  her  to  submit  herself  to  re- 
flection or  constraint.  There  were,  moreover,  so  many  distractions 
at  the  court,  so  many  social  and  family  obligations,  that  there  was 
scarce  time  to  think  of  any  regular  instruction. 

Would  you  like  to  know  how  Marie  Antoinette  employed  her 
time  during  the  first  months  of  her  sojourn  in  France?  Here  is 
a  description  which  she  gave  her  mother  in  a  letter  written  on  the 
1 2th  of  July,  1770:  — 

"  I  rise  at  ten  o'clock  or  at  nine  or  at  half-past  nine,  and  having  dressed 
myself,  say  my  morning  prayers ;  then  I  breakfast,  and  afterwards  I  go  to 
my  aunts,  where  I  usually  find  the  king.  This  ksts  until  half-past  ten ; 
then  at  eleven  I  have  my  hair  dressed.  At  noon  the  chamber  is  an- 
nounced, and  every  one  can  enter  who  is  not  a  common  person.  I  put 
on  my  rouge  and  wash  my  hands  before  them  all ;  then  the  men  retire,  and 
the  ladies  remain  and  I  dress  myself  before  them.  There  is  mass  at  noon. 
If  the  king  is  at  Versailles,  I  go  with  him  and  my  husband  and  aunts  to 
mass  ;  if  he  is  not  there,  I  go  alone  with  Monsieur  the  Dauphin,  but  always 
at  the  same  hour.  After  mass  the  two  of  us  dine  in  public  ;  but  that  is  over 
at  half-past  one,  for  we  both  eat  very  fast.  From  there  I  go  to  the  apart- 
ment of  Monsieur  the  Dauphin,  or  if  he  is  busy,  I  return  to  my  own.  I 
read,  I  write,  or  I  work  ;  for  I  am  now  working  a  vest  for  the  king  which 
does  not  get  on  very  rapidly,  but  which  I  hope  with  the  grace  of  God  to 
have  finished  in  a  few  years.  At  three  o'clock  I  go  again  to  my  aunts, 
where  the  king  also  goes  at  that  hour. 


HER   READING.  43 


"  At  four  the  abbe  comes  to  me ;  at  five  every  day  a  teacher  of  the 
harpsichord  or  of  singing,  and  remains  until  six.  At  half-past  six  I  almost 
always  go  to  my  aunts  if  I  do  not  go  to  walk  ;  I  must  tell  you  that  my 
husband  almost  always  goes  with  me  to  my  aunts.  There  is  play  from 
seven  to  nine  o'clock  ;  but  when  the  weather  is  fine,  I  go  for  a  walk,  and 
then  there  is  no  play  in  my  apartment,  but  in  that  of  my  aunts.  At  nine 
o'clock  we  sup,  and  when 'the  king  is  not  there  my  aunts  come  and  sup 
with  us ;  but  when  the  king  is  there  we  go  and  sup  with  them.  We  wait 
for  the  king,  who  usually  comes  at  a  quarter  to  eleven ;  as  for  me,  while  I 
wait  I  throw  myself  on  a  large  sofa  and  sleep  until  the  arrival  of  the  king ; 
but  when  he  is  not  there  we  go  to  bed  at  eleven." 

At  Choisy  the  day  was  still  longer,  and  the  play  was  often  kept 
up  till  half-past  one  in  the  morning. 

In  this  programme,  at  once  so  full  and  so  empty,  in  this  life  so 
occupied,  yet  without  any  true  occupations,  where  could  one  find 
time  for  any  serious  pursuits,  —  we  will  not  say  studies,  but  simply 
reading?  Marie  Antoinette  hardly  had  time  to  write  to  her  mother ; 
she  was  often  obliged  to  do  it  while  at  her  toilette,  and  yet  we 
know  how  well  she  loved  her.  If  time  were  wanting  for  the 
accomplishment  of  a  duty  which  was  so  imperative  and  so  dear 
to  her  heart,  how  was  she  to  find  time  each  day  for  steady  applica- 
tion, very  useful,  no  doubt,  but  which  should  have  preceded  her 
marriage,  and  for  which,  it  must  be  confessed,  she  had  always 
very  little  inclination?  "She  has  an  excellent  and  ready  under- 
standing, which  grasps  and  retains  what  she  reads,"  Mercy 
wrote;  "  but  she  devotes  too  little  time  to  that  employment." 

This  was  a  source  of  great  anxiety  to  Maria  Theresa.  She  felt 
that  the  education  of  her  daughter  had  not  received  sufficient 
attention  at  Vienna ;  and  she  would  have  been  glad  to  have  her 
perfect  it  at  Versailles,  also  to  have  he.-  find  time,  in  the  midst 
of  the  frivolous  round  of  the  court,  for  some  solid  reading  as  a 
supplement  to  her  instruction.  She  returned  to  this  point  inces- 
santly in  her  letters,  and  begged  to  receive  an  account  of  such 
reading,  and  even  that  a  journal  of  it  should  be  kept  for  her 
benefit.  Marie  Antoinette  was  greatly  embarrassed  by  this  de- 
mand ;  her  natural  vivacity,  the  petulance  characteristic  of  her 
age,  her  repugnance  to  apply  a. mind  easily  distracted,  her  fre- 
quent visits  to  her  aunts,  her  walks  during  the  fine  season,  her 
desire  to  discuss  the  thousand  objects,  "  interesting  because  of 
their  beauty  or  novelty,"  did  not  always  allow  her  to  keep  regu- 
larly the  hour  appointed  for  reading  in  the  programme,  already  so 


44  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

crowded,  of  the  day.  Not  that  she  was  always  idle.  Several  times 
Mercy  had  occasion  to  praise  her  faithfulness  to  her  work ;  and 
Vermond  remarked  that  her  language  had  improved,  and  that 
she  expressed  herself  "  easily,  agreeably,  and  nobly  on  occasion 
and  on  notable  subjects."  But  there  were  times  when  she  took 
more  interest  in  her  first  waiting-woman's  little  boy,  or  in  the 
gambols  of  her  little  dog  Mop,  than  in  the  "  Lettres  du  Comte 
de  Tessin,"  or  in  the  "  Bagatelles  morales  "  of  the  Abbe  Coyer. 
She  knew  not  therefore  what  to  reply  to  her  mother.  Too  frank 
to  dissemble  the  truth,  it  also  cost  her  too  much  to  acknowledge 
it.  Moreover,  it  was  not  so  simple  a  matter  as  it  would  seem  to 
give  the  account  which  the  empress  demanded.  The  young  prin- 
cess, as  was  natural  enough,  did  not  wish  to  write  it,  or  to  have 
anything  known  of  it ;  her  vanity  would  have  blushed  before  her 
husband  and  aunts  to  seem  to  be  still  in  the  schoolroom.  Yet  how 
was  she  to  write  it  without  having  her  letters  and  abstracts  seen  ? 
Whether  rightly  or  wrongly,  Marie  Antoinette  believed  that 
none  of  her  papers  were  safe  from  inspection ;  she  was  afraid  of 
duplicate  keys.  Not  knowing  what  to  do,  she  did  what  most 
people  do  in  a  perplexing  situation, —  she  did  nothing.  Despite 
her  docility  in  the  face  of  her  counsellors,  her  submission  to  her 
mother,  and  her  respect  for  and  confidence  in  her,  she  did  not  re- 
ply to  her  pressing  questions.  The  empress  became  vexed  ;  she 
returned  to  the  charge  with  a  severity  that  bordered  upon  injustice, 
and  an  insistence  that  ended  by  irritating  Marie  Antoinette. 

"  Try  to  furnish  out  your  mind  with  a  little  good  reading.  .  .  .  Do  not 
neglect  this  resource,  which  is  more  necessary  to  you  than  to  another, 
since  you  have  learned  neither  music,  nor  drawing,  nor  dancing,  nor  paint- 
ing, nor  any  pleasing  accomplishment.  I  icturn,  then,  to  your  reading; 
and  you  must  charge  the  abbe  to  send  me  every  month  an  account  of 
what  you  have  finished  and  of  what  you  intend  to  begin." 

This  time  the  lesson  was  too  severe;  it  overpassed  the  mark. 
"  See,  Monsieur  1'Abbe,"  she  said  to  Vermond  ;  "  if  any  one  saw 
that,  it  would  redound  greatly  to  my  honour  indeed  !  "  And 
having  read  the  passage  we  have  just  quoted,  she  added  angrily, 
"  Truly,  she  would  make  me  pass  for  an  animal !  "  Then  calming 
herself  a  little,  she  continued :  "  Ah,  well !  I  shall  answer  that  it 
will  be  impossible  for  me  to  undertake  any  reading  during  the 
Carnival,  but  that  I  shall  do  so  in  Lent.  Will  that  do?  "  "  Yes, 
Madame,  provided  that  you  are  in  earnest." 


COUNSELS   OF    MARIA   THERESA.  45 

We  have  given  this  little  scene,  as  it  serves  to  show  Marie 
Antoinette's  character  at  this  period,  and  the  nature  of  her  rela- 
tions with  Maria  Theresa,  —  incessant  direction,  for  the  most 
part  imperiously  given,  from  the  mother;  and  on  the  part  of  the 
daughter  a  little  impatience  at  this  hidden  surveillance  and  per- 
petual scolding;  sometimes  a  fleeting  determination  to  escape 
from  it,  and,  what  was  very  human,  an  effort  to  put  off,  perhaps 
with  the  intention  of  eluding,  a  wearisome  task ;  but  at  bottom, 
sincere  respect  and  genuine  docility,  which  was  only  thwarted  by 
the  thousand  interruptions  of  her  day  and  her  extreme  vivacity 
of  disposition. 

But  Maria  Theresa  was  not  satisfied  with  this  promise,  which 
seemed  to  her  but  a  subterfuge.  In  the  following  letter  she 
insists  afresh :  — 

"  I  await  with  impatience  to  learn,  on  the  return  of  this  courier,  of  your 
reading  and  industry.  It  is  permissible  —  above  all,  at  your  age  —  to  amuse 
oneself;  but  to  make  it  one's  sole  occupation,  to  do  nothing  that  is  solid 
or  useful,  to  kill  time  between  walks  and  visits,  —  in  the  end  you  will  real- 
ize the  emptiness  of  it,  and  will  feel  many  regrets  for  not  having  better 
employed  your  time.  I  must  again  repeat  to  you  that  the  handwriting 
of  your  letters  becomes  every  day  worse  and  less  correct.  In  these  ten 
months  you  should  have  improved.  I  was  greatly  humiliated  on  seeing 
something  you  had  written  to  some  ladies  pass  through  several  hands; 
you  must  practise  with  the  abbe',  or  with  some  one  else,  to  form  a  better 
hand,  and  to  write  more  evenly." 

Marie  Antoinette  might  have  answered  that  it  would  have  been 
difficult  for  her  to  do  in  ten  months  at  Versailles,  in  the  midst  of 
distractions  without  number,  what  they  had  failed  to  teach  her  in 
ten  years  at  Vienna  in  the  quiet  of  the  schoolroom.  But  she  was 
too  respectful.  She  was,  moreover,  sincere  in  her  promise  to 
occupy  herself  more  seriously  during  Lent ;  and  she  was  faithful 
in  doing  so.  From  the  month  of  March  she  sent  a  journal  of 
her  reading,  which  she  pursued  with  more  regularity.  The  Abbe 
de  Vermond  himself  asserted  that  the  dauphiness's  ideas  were 
becoming  "  more  systematic  and  her  language  more  connected." 
With  her  vivacity  of  disposition,  it  was  difficult  without  doubt  to 
avoid  relapses.  Sometimes  Marie  Antoinette's  interest  in  her 
waiting-woman's  boy,  or  a  gallop  on  her  horse  or  her  donkey,  or 
her  walks  during  the  summer,  and  the  amusements  of  the  Carnival 
during  the  winter  would  interrupt  her  studies.  But  it  is  certain 
—  and  the  impartial  reports  of  Mercy  prove  it  —  that  the  young 


46  LIFE   OF   MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

girl  made  a  sincere  effort  to  keep  her  promise  to  her  mother. 
The  faithful  ambassador  notes  a  change  for  the  better  in  his 
august  pupil.  The  conversations  with  the  Abbe  de  Vermond  be- 
came longer,  more  serious,  and  more  instructive.  Music,  dan- 
cing, and  embroidery  alternated  with  her  studies.  Sometimes  the 
reading  lasted  for  several  hours,  the  dauphiness  herself  reading, 
or  else  the  Abbe  de  Vermond,  while  she  busied  herself  with  some 
handiwork,  for  which  she  ever  manifested  great  fondness.  The 
choice  of  books  was  of  such  a  kind  as  to  form  her  understanding, 
—  well-written  letters,  sermons,  historical  treatises,  and  memoirs, 
sometimes  plays,  but  never  novels  or  other  frivolous  books,  for 
which  she  exhibited  no  curiosity.  They  read  the  "  Anecdotes  de 
la  Cour  de  Philippe-Auguste,"  the  "  Memoires  de  FEstoile,"  the 
"  Lettres  d'une  mere  a  sa  fille,"  the  "  Livre  de  Tobie,"  the  "  Petit- 
Careme  "  by  Massillon,  the  works  of  Bossuet,  Hume's  "  History 
of  England."  In  short,  she  soon  found  herself  more  learned  in 
history,  and  particularly  in  French  history,  than  the  princes  and 
princesses  of  the  royal  family.  She  did  more :  from  pupil,  she 
became  mentor,  and  had  the  "  Memoires  de  Sully "  read  to  the 
dauphin. 

For  herself  she  laid  out  a  whole  plan  of  study,  and  in  order  to 
render  the  promise  which  she  made  to  herself  somewhat  more 
binding,  she  made  a  memorandum  of  it. 

At  this  time  Mercy  wrote  of  her :  — 

"  It  seems  that  her  Royal  Highness  has  wished  to  bind  herself  to  a  con- 
stant and  invariable  routine,  and  to  help  her  to  do  so  has  written  a  sort  of 
memorandum  of  the  disposition  of  the  hours  of  her  day,  which  she  has  had 
the  goodness  to  read  to  me.  It  says  that  on  rising  Madame  1'Archiduchesse 
will  employ  the  first  moments  in  prayer,  then  that  she  will  busy  herself  with 
her  music,  dancing,  and  one  hour  of  '  sensible  reading ; '  this  is  the  expres- 
sion used  in  her  memorandum.  Her  toilette,  a  visit  to  the  king,  mass,  and 
dinner  will  occupy  the  rest  of  the  morning.  In  the  afternoon  there  is  an 
hour  and  a  half  assigned  to  the  continuation  of  the  sensible  reading ;  a 
walk  or  the  hunt,  and  conversation  with  Monsieur  the  Dauphin  and  with 
the  others  of  the  royal  family,  find  their  respective  places.  I  have  respect- 
fully exhorted  Madame  the  Dauphiness  not  to  depart  from  so  wise  and 
well-arranged  a  plan.  She  answered  with  her  usual  good  faith,  *  I  know 
not  if  I  shall  fulfil  all  this  very  exactly,  but  I  shall  hold  myself  to  it  as  far 
as  possible.' " 

When  one  compares  this  programme  with  the  one  of  July  12, 
1770,  one  can  judge  of  the  pfogress  made  in  two  years.  And,  in 


HER   OBEDIENCE   TO    MARIA   THERESA.  47 

fact,  with  the  exception  of  a  little  dissipation  the  following  sum- 
mer, —  above  all,  during  a  journey  to  Compiegne,  where  the  walks 
and  hunting  allowed  of  but  little  assiduity,  —  Marie  Antoinette  was 
faithful  to  this  plan.  The  repugnance  which  she  had  at  first  mani- 
fested for  serious  pursuits  had  disappeared.  From  this  time  forth 
she  gave  herself  up  to  them,  not  only  without  distaste,  but  with 
pleasure.  During  the  month  of  November,  despite  the  distractions 
of  the  autumn,  she  devoted  two  hours  a  day  to  them.  Amid  the 
celebrations  of  the  marriage  of  the  Comte  d'Artois  she  reserved 
one  hour  for  meditation.  And  when  winter  brought  with  it 
greater  calm  and  liberty,  it  was  not  one  hour  but  two  that  the 
dauphiness  consecrated  to  reading  and  the  commentaries  with 
which  the  Abbe  de  Vermond  accompanied  it,  and  two  hours  more 
for  music  and  dancing.  "  In  this  way,"  Mercy  wrote,  "  the  days 
are  sufficiently  well  filled,  and  I  think  that  Your  Majesty  has  every 
reason  to  be  satisfied  with  her." 


CHAPTER    V. 

WHAT  MUST  BE  THOUGHT  OF  MARIA  THERESA'S  REPROOFS. —  THE 
COUNSELLORS  OF  MARIE  ANTOINETTE.  —  THE  COMTE  DE  MERCY  : 
HIS  MEANS  OF  INFORMATION.  —  THE  ABBE  DE  VERMOND.  —  MARIE 
ANTOINETTE'S  FONDNESS  FOR  RIDING. —  THE  INFLUENCE  OF  MES- 
DAMES. —  HOW  THIS  INFLUENCE  WAS  GAINED.  —  THE  HOUSEHOLD 
OF  THE  DAUPHINESS.  —  THE  COMTESSE  DE  NOAILLES.  —  MADAME 
L'£TIQUETTE. — THE  COMTESSE  DE  Cossfi  AND  THE  COMTESSE  DE 
MAILLY. —  THE  TAKING  OF  THE  VEIL  BY  MADAME  LOUISE.  —  THE 
DISADVANTAGE  OF  THE  INFLUENCE  OF  MESDAMES  UPON  THEIR 
NIECE.  —  THE  COMTESSE  DE  NARBONNE  AND  THE  MARQUISE 
DE  DURFORT.  —  THE  RELATION  OF  THE  KlNG  AND  MARIE  AN- 
TOINETTE.—  DIMINUTION  OF  THE  INFLUENCE  OF  MESDAMES.  —  THE 
DISSATISFACTION  OF  MADAME  ADELAIDE  ;  HER  SPITEFULNESS. 

THE  absence  of  serious  pursuits  was  the  principal,  but  not 
the  only  reproach  which  Maria  Theresa  addressed  to  Marie 
Antoinette.  Her  maternal  solicitude  was  ever  on  the  alert,  and 
was  directed  toward  everything;  and  one  is  truly  justified  in 
thinking  that  if  she  had  devoted  half  as  much  anxious  surveil- 
lance to  the  education  of  her  daughter  as  she  exercised  over 
her  conduct  at  Versailles,  many  of  the  faults  of  which  she  was 
later  the  most  merciless  censor  might  have  been  corrected.  We 
must  not,  however,  always  take  her  reproofs  literally.  The  em- 
press often  exaggerated  the  evil  in  order  more  effectually  to 
arouse  the  amour-propre  of  the  dauphiness,  and  to  "  give  her  soul 
a  shake."  She  herself  acknowledges  that  she  often  wrote  too 
severely  in  order  to  wake  her  from  her  "  lethargy."  She  was 
exactly  informed  of  everything  that  occurred  at  Versailles  by  her 
faithful  minister,  the  Comte  de  Mercy- Argenteau,  —  one  of  the 
most  original  figures,  perhaps,  of  that  epoch.  Mercy,  who  had 
represented  Austria  at  Paris  for  several  years,  knew  the  court  of 
France  by  heart,  had  studied  all  its  personages,  learned  thoroughly 
all  its  springs  and  intrigues,  and,  charged  by  his  sovereign  to 
support  and  direct  the  steps  of  the  archduchess  on  that  slippery 


THE    COMTE    DE    MERCY.  49 

ground,  fulfilled  his  mission  to  the  end  with  a  devotion,  perspicu- 
ity, vigilance,  and  sincerity  beyond  all  praise. 

It  is  curious  to  investigate  the  complicated  system  by  means  of 
which  the  clever  diplomat  was  able  to  follow  day  by  day  and 
almost  hour  by  hour  the  actions  of  his  pupil.  With  regard  to  this 
system  he  wrote  as  follows :  — 

"  I  am  sure  of  three  persons  in  the  service  of  Madame  1'Archiduchesse, 
—  one  of  her  waiting-women  and  two  lackeys,  who  give  me  an  exact  ac- 
count of  all  that  passes  in  her  rooms.  I  am  informed  each  day  of  the 
conversations  of  the  archduchess  with  the  Abbe  de  Vermond,  from  whom 
she  conceals  nothing ;  I  learn  through  the  Marquise  de  Durfort  the  least 
detail  of  all  that  is  said  in  the  apartment  of  Mesdames,  and  I  have  a  greater 
number  of  people  and  sources  through  which  I  hear  all  that  takes  place  in 
the  king's  apartment  when  Madame  the  Dauphiness  is  there.  To  these  I 
add  my  own  observations,  so  that  there  is  not  an  hour  in  the  day  when  I 
am  not  prepared  to  give  an  account  of  what  Madame  1'Archiduchesse  may 
have  said  or  done  or  heard  ;  .  .  .  and  I  have  pushed  my  researches  to  this 
extent  because  I  knew  that  your  Majesty's  peace  depended  upon  it." 

It  must  be  said  for  the  honour  of  the  ambassador  that  he  hid 
nothing  from  the  empress.  He  never  asserted  a  fact  without  the 
most  absolute  certainty  of  it,  nor  did  he  ever  conceal  one  if  he 
were  sure  of  it;  never — for  he  had  given  his  promise,  and  he 
kept  it — -  never  did  he  seek  to  tranquillize  his  august  sovereign  at 
the  expense  of  the  truth  ;  he  told  her  everything,  —  trivial  faults 
as  well  as  more  serious  defects. 

And  what  is  more  necessary  to  note,  he  showed  so  much  tact 
in  the  fulfilment  of  his  delicate  mission,  he  knew  so  well  how  to 
disguise  the  odious  side  of  it,  and  to  temper  what  might  have 
seemed  hard  by  a  devotion  above  all  proof  and  an  almost  pater- 
nal affection,  —  that  Marie  Antoinette,  watched,  spied  upon,  if  you 
will,  scolded  by  him  respectfully  but  mercilessly,  never  was  angry 
with  him  for  it;  she  did  not  always  follow  his  counsels,  but  she 
never  lost  her  temper  with  him.  nor  was  her  confidence  in  him 
ever  shaken.  "  T  is  most  fortunate,"  Mercy  wrote,  "  that  Madame 
the  Dauphiness  honours  us,  the  abbe  and  me,  with  her  confidence, 
and  that  she  shows  us  greater  kindness,  inasmuch  as  we  tell  her 
the  truth  without  circumlocution  and  without  flattery."  This 
acknowledgment  under  such  difficult  circumstances  does  as  much 
honour  to  the  pupil  as  to  the  mentor. 

The  assistant  of  Mercy  in  this  delicate  mission  was,  as  we  have 
already  seen,  the  Abbe  de  Vermond,  who,  from  being  the  precep- 
VOL.  i. — 4 


50  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

tor  of  the  archduchess  of  Austria,  had  become  reader  to  the  dau- 
phiness  of  France,  "  in  order  to  continue  the  functions  he  had 
discharged  at  Vienna,  of  guiding  and  perfecting  the  accomplish- 
ments which  Madame  the  Dauphiness  manifested  so  great  a  desire 
to  cultivate."  Despite  many  vexations  and  a  few  periods  of  dis- 
couragement, he  remained  steadfast  to  the  task  confided  to  him. 
His  eyes,  he  has  himself  said,  were  ever  open,  alternately  be- 
cause of  disquietude  or  delight.  The  jealousies  of  his  rivals  and 
court  spites  have  calumniated  him.  Madame  Campan  has  rep- 
resented him  as  Marie  Antoinette's  evil  genius,  —  as  an  intrigu- 
ing, domineering,  and  ambitious  man.  History  to-day,  being 
better  informed,  has  rehabilitated  the  Abbe  de  Vermond,  and 
restored  to  him  his  true  character.  If  we  are  justified  in  accusing 
him  of  not  always  being  disinterested,  —  and  yet  the  abbacies 
which  he  demanded,  according  to  the  usages  of  that  epoch,  rep- 
resented but  a  mediocre  revenue  for  a  man  obliged  to  live  at 
court,  and  whose  emoluments  were  not  paid  with  any  regularity, 

—  if  we  must  regret  that  his  guidance  was  not  always  very  en- 
lightened, we  must  recognize  in  him  a  zealous  and  intelligent 
collaborator  of  the  Comte  de  Mercy  in  the  work  of  protection  and 
preservation  which  Maria  Theresa  had  confided  to  him  ;   an  acute 
observer,  a  devoted  servitor  of  Marie  Antoinette,  —  the  only  one 
of  her  household,  according  to  the  ambassador,  who  did  her  real 
service,  by  "  telling  her  the  truth,  and  making  her  feel  it." 

Thanks  to  this  double  supervision,  so  well  guarded  by  a  double 
affection,  Maria  Theresa  could  at  Vienna  follow  all  the  actions  of 
her  daughter.  She  followed  her  at  Versailles,  at  Fontainebleau, 
at  Compiegne ;  she  followed  her  to  the  ball,  to  the  hunt,  to  her 
apartment.  As  soon  as  any  difficulty  was  sighted,  a  letter  was 
immediately  despatched  from  Schoenbrunn  or  from  Laxemburg, 

—  a  letter  of  reprimand  or  of  counsel.     If  she  saw  that  the  dau- 
phiness  was  growing  negligent  in  her  bearing,  or  that  her  figure 
was  being  spoiled,  she  wrote  to  her  to  wear  stays  ;  and  after  some 
reluctance  Marie  Antoinette  submitted  to  do  so.     But  she  was  not 
always  so  docile ;   and  a  new  influence  was  about  to  combat  and 
sometimes  to  triumph  over  that  of  her  mother. 

Soon  after  her  arrival  in  France  the  archduchess  expressed  a 
desire  to  ride.  The  empress  was  frightened  ;  at  fifteen,  while  still 
growing,  it  seemed  to  her  that  it  would  be  a  risk  which  might 
entail  dangerous  consequences  for  the  future.  She  appealed  to 
Choiseul ;  and  the  king,  forewarned  by  his  minister,  did  not  give 


INFLUENCE    OF    MESDAMES. 


the  permission  which  the  dauphiness  solicited;  he  only  allowed 
her  to  mount  a  donkey.  A  very  gentle  one  was  chosen,  and  this 
new  amusement  gave  great  pleasure  to  the  young  princess.  But 
soon  the  donkey  ceased  to  satisfy  her ;  she  had  so  many  good 
reasons  to  prefer  a  nobler  mount.  Her  aunts  encouraged  her; 
the  king  and  the  dauphin,  who  loved  to  hunt,  would  have  been 
delighted  to  have  her  accompany  them ;  they  were  at  Fontaine- 
bleau ;  the  occasion  was  propitious.  Madame  Adelaide  under- 
took to  overcome  the  difficulties  and  obtain  the  king's  permission. 
A  horse  was  secretly  conveyed  with  the  donkey  to  a  place  agreed 
upon  in  the  forest ;  and  when  the  dauphiness  arrived  she  sent  away 
the  donkey  and  jumped  upon  the  horse.  She  was  very  proud  of, 
but  also  somewhat  embarrassed  by,  her  small  victory.  What 
should  she  say  to  Mercy's  objections?  How  escape  her  mother's 
reproaches?  She  compromised  by  promising  never  to  follow  the 
hunt;  but  the  opportunity,  the  pleasure,  a  crowd  of  excuses,  good 
or  bad,  tempted  her  often  to  break  this  pledge.  Maria  Theresa 
returned  more  than  once  to  this  delicate  subject;  finding  it  im- 
possible to  overcome  her  daughter's  strong  inclination  for  this 
diversion,  she  resigned  herself  to  cautioning  her  to  be  careful, 
which  advice  was  usually  followed. 

It  was  Mesdames,  as  we  have  just  seen,  who  counselled  the  dau- 
phiness to  try  this  new  species  of  recreation,  and  who  tempted 
her  for  the  first  time  to  disobey  her  mother.  Their  influence  at 
that  moment  was  preponderant,  and  Maria  Theresa  was  justly 
alarmed  at  it.  When  her  daughter  had  set  out  for  France,  she 
had  felt  obliged  to  say  to  her :  "  Love  your  aunts  ;  those  princesses 
have  many  virtues  and  talents ;  it  is  fortunate  for  you.  I  hope 
that  you  will  deserve  their  friendship."  What  other  guidance 
indeed  could  she  recommend  in  the  royal  family?  The  dauphin 
was  too  young  and  inexperienced  himself  to  direct  the  youth  and 
inexperience  of  his  wife. 

As  for  the  king,  he  had  never  asserted  any  authority  over  his 
children.  He  had  never  been  able  to  bring  himself  to  govern 
them,  to  advise  them,  or  to  correct  them  in  any  way  whatsoever. 
He  loved  his  family,  but  with  that  selfish  affection  which  does 
not  wish  to  give  or  take  trouble.  Provided  that  he  was  not  in- 
terfered with  in  his  pleasures,  he  allowed  others  every  liberty  in 
their  amusements. 

There  was  of  course  Mercy,  who  had  the  entire  confidence  of 
the  empress,  and  who  deserved  it.  "  See  Mercy  often,"  Maria 


52  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Theresa  repeated  to  her  daughter  incessantly.  "  Follow  all  the 
counsels  he  gives  you."  "  Mercy  is  charged  to  speak  plainly 
to  you."  And  by  the  side  of  Mercy  was  Vcrmond.  But  Ver- 
mond  occupied  only  a  subordinate  position;  and  Mercy,  being  a 
foreign  minister,  and  consequently  looked  upon  with  suspicion  at 
the  court  of  France,  was  bound  to  an  extreme  reserve,  and  could 
have  audience  only  once  or  twice  a  week.  In  any  case,  neither 
of  them  could  be  society  for  the  young  princess. 

If  from  the  royal  family  we  turn  to  the  household  of  the  dau- 
phiness,  we  find  in  the  first  place  her  lady  of  honour,  the  Comtesse 
de  Noailles,  "  Madame  1'Ktiquette,"  as  Marie  Antoinette  called 
her  in  jest.  She  was  a  woman  of  irreproachable  conduct,  but 
possessed  of  a  seriousness  that  was  somewhat  heavy,  and  of  a 
mind  somewhat  limited,  joining  to  a  stiff  bearing  and  an  austere 
manner  little  tricks  of  flattery  which  the  keen  wit  of  her  young 
mistress  could  not  fail  to  detect.  The  exaggerated  importance 
which  she  attached  to  wearisome  regulations,  many  of  which  had  a 
reason  for  existing,  but  others  of  which  were  childish  and  whose 
use,  moreover,  she  did  not  explain,  exasperated  the  dauphiness, 
while  her  obsequious  complaisance  irritated  her.  Despite  these 
disadvantages  Madame  de  Noailles  was  perhaps  the  one  woman 
at  the  court  who  was  well  suited  to  her  high  office.  The  exalted 
position  of  her  family  had  prepared  her  for  it,  and  her  own  incon- 
testable virtue  rendered  her  worthy  of  it.  Mercy  made  use- of 
her  more  than  once  to  counteract  the  all-powerful  influence  of 
Mesdames. 

Next  to  her  came  the  lady  of  the  bedchamber,  the  Duchesse 
de  Cosse",  daughter  of  the  Due  de  Nivernais, —  a  reserved  young 
woman  with  abundance  of  discretion,  who  added  to  the  charm 
of  a  clear  understanding  great  tact,  and  of  whom  the  empe- 
ror one  day  declared  that  in  her  head  an  English  mind  was 
found  side  by  side  with  a  French  imagination ;  she  was,  more- 
over, sincerely  devoted  and  sincerely  beloved,  and  when  later  the 
illness  of  her  son  forced  her  to  resign  her  office,  she  left  to  the 
queen,  under  the  title  of  a  "  testament  of  fidelity,"  some  excellent 
advice  concerning  the  intrigues  of  the  court  and  the  traps  which 
were  spread  for  her. 

Among  the  other  ladies  of  the  dauphiness's  household  some 
were  gentle  and  intelligent,  like  the  Marquise  de  Mailly,  a  per- 
fectly good  woman,  though  heedless ;  but  while  these  were 
in  every  way  irreproachable,  they  offered  no  kind  of  support. 


INFLUENCE   OF   MESDAMES.  53 

Others,  like  Madame  de  Chimay,  though  of  undoubted  virtue, 
failed  to  inspire  confidence  either  in  the  ambassador  or  the 
princess ;  and  others  again  no  longer  possessed  a  spotless  repu- 
tation, —  as,  for  example,  the  Duchesse  de  Chaulnes,  witty  but 
bad,  who  crowned  a  series  of  adventures  and  extravagances  by 
an  absurd  marriage. 

Considering  all  things,  and  especially  the  situation  of  affairs  we 
have  just  described,  it  was  but  natural  that  Marie  Antoinette 
should  draw  near  to  her  aunts,  and  that  her  mother  should  en- 
courage her  to  do  so.  Mercy  himself,  who  knew  the  court  so 
well,  recognized  the  advantages  of  this  intimacy,  but  he  soon 
added  that  she  should  not  give  herself  up  to  it  without  a  certain 
amount  of  circumspection.  What  seems  most  surprising  to  us  at 
first  is  that  Mesdames,  with  their  prejudices  against  the  Austrian 
alliance,  should  have  lent  themselves  so  readily  to  the  intimacy. 
Did  they  think  that  they  were  fulfilling  a  duty  toward  their  young 
niece,  cast  without  pilot  or  rudder  upon  the  stormy  sea  of  Ver- 
sailles? Or  did  they  too  yield  to  the  power  of  that  grace  which 
held  every  one  as  by  a  charm?  Or  was  it  calculation  on  their 
part;  and,  jealous  of  the  new  influence  that  had  appeared  on  the 
horizon  of  the  court,  did  they  embrace  their  rival  in  order  the 
better  to  strangle  her?  We  would  not  like  to  swear  that  this 
consideration  was  wholly  absent  from  the  motives  which  guided, 
if  not  the  three  sisters,  —  we  would  gladly  make  exception  of 
the  worthy  Madame  Victoire,  —  at  least  Madame  Adelaide,  the 
politician  of  the  family,  and  the  recognized  head  of  that  august 
trinity  which  reigned  in  the  private  apartments  of  the  chateau. 

The  arrival  of  the  dauphiness  upset  all  their  projects  and 
forced  them  again  into  a  secondary  position.  After  the  death  of 
Marie  Josephe  of  Saxe,  Mesdames  held  after  their  father  the 
highest  rank  at  court :  the  king's  play  was  held  in  their  apart- 
ment. In  the  future  this  function  would  belong  to  the  dauphiness. 
That  Madame  Adelaide  should  look  upon  this  change  with  dis- 
pleasure seems  scarcely  doubtful.  From  that  to  hiding  her  dis- 
pleasure beneath  an  amiable  exterior,  and  seeking  to  destroy  an 
influence  against  which  she  might  have  found  it  difficult  to  strug- 
gle, by  dominating  and  absorbing  it,  was  a  natural  transition,  a 
plan  which  would  tempt  the  scheming  mind  of  the  daughter  of 
Louis  XV. 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  reason,  the  intimacy  between  the 
niece  and  aunts  was  established  from  the  beginning-.  Charmed 


54  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

by  their  advances,  and  feeling  the  necessity  of  support,  the  young 
princess  yielded  to  it  with  that  spontaneity  and  frankness  which 
was  the  basis  and  attraction  of  her  character. 

A  touching  ceremonial  which  soon  occurred  served  in  a  way  as 
a  further  bond  of  union.  On  the  loth  of  October,  1770,  after  the 
five  months  of  waiting  insisted  upon  by  her  father,  Madame  Lou- 
ise took  the  veil  of  the  Carmelites  of  St.  Denys,  and  it  was  from 
the  hands  of  the  dauphiness  that  she  received  it.  Despite  the 
reluctance  of  the  humble  sister  the  ceremony  was  one  of  great 
splendour.  The  Papal  Nuncio  was  present,  and  twenty-two 
bishops  assisted ;  and  the  daughter  of  France  for  that  one  day 
resumed  the  costume  and  following  of  a  powerful  princess.  But 
when  after  the  usual  question,  she  reappeared  in  the  choir,  de- 
prived of  her  rich  array  and  clad  in  a  coarse  habit,  to  kneel  at  the 
feet  of  her  niece,  all  eyes  were  wet,  and  the  dauphiness  herself 
watered  with  her  tears  the  scapular  and  cloak  with  which  she  in- 
vested the  humble  postulant. 

Both  Mesdames  and  the  king  felt  that  they  had  not  sufficient 
fortitude  to  be  present  at  this  great  sacrifice;  it  would  have  cut 
them  to  the  heart,  so  says  a  letter  from  a  Carmelite ;  they  gath- 
ered eagerly,  however,  every  echo  of  it  from  the  lips  of  their 
niece  ;  and  it  would  seem  that  the  friendship  of  Marie  Antoinette 
and  her  aunts  was  strengthened  by  this  noble  example  and  noble 
lesson. 

The  effects  of  their  influence  were  soon  apparent.  Mesdames 
were  timid  even  with  their  father ;  they  cared  not  for  the  world ; 
they  were  fearful  of  appearing  in  public;  they  lived  in  a  small 
circle  of  intimates  which  too  often  transformed  itself  into  a  small 
circle  of  intriguers,  before  whom  they  allowed  themselves  to  make 
remarks  which  were,  to  say  the  least,  indiscreet,  and  criticisms 
which  were  malicious.  The  dauphiness  fell  into  the  way  of  join- 
ing in  their  discourse.  Under  their  encouragement  her  natural 
turn  for  satire  was  given  full  play,  under  the  impression  that 
it  would  be  confined  within  the  narrow  boundaries  of  a  limited 
circle ;  and  her  witty  sayings,  which  were  of  course  immediately 
repeated  throughout  the  court  and  wickedly  added  to,  hurt  those 
against  whom  they  were  directed,  and  vexed  the  king.  It  is  even 
asserted  that  she  ridiculed  the  eccentricities  of  certain  persons  to 
their  faces. 

Then  on  a  sudden  the  young  princess  became  timid,  like  her 
aunts,  brusque,  shy,  notwithstanding  the  success  she  had  enjoyed 


THE   MISCHIEVOUS    MESDAMES.  55 

in  the  world.  She  no  longer  spoke  to  personages  of  distinction ; 
she  dared  not  address  the  king;  she  no  longer  held  the  play  in 
her  apartment ;  she  withdrew  as  much  as  possible  from  her  duties 
of  receiving,  or  when  she  was  obliged  to  fulfil  them  she  was  fright- 
fully agitated. 

One  day,  it  was  on  the  4th  of  September,  1770,  the  corps  de 
ville  of  Paris  and  the  States  of  Languedoc  were  to  be  presented 
to  the  dauphiness,  the  first  by  the  Due  de  Chevreuse,  governor  of 
Paris,  and  the  second  by  the  Comte  d'Eu,  governor  of  the  prov- 
ince. Mesdames,  who  were  always  awkward  in  their  bearing 
whenever  they  had  to  appear  in  public,  tried  to  persuade  their 
niece  to  receive  the  addresses  without  replying  to  them,  saying 
that  they  never  did  otherwise.  Fortunately  Mercy  heard  of  it. 
He  combated  energetically  the  counsels  of  Mesdames.  Marie 
Antoinette  listened  to  him :  she  responded  to  the  corps  de  ville 
and  to  the  States  with  much  grace ;  the  deputation  and  the  public 
were  enchanted  with  her. 

But  the  faithful  ambassador  was  not  always  there  to  fight 
against  the  preponderating  influence  of  the  aunts.  It  was  diffi- 
cult for  him  in  his  bi-weekly  visits  to  correct  the  bad  impression 
produced  by  daily  conversation  and  example.  The  insinuations 
of  the  old  princesses,  falling  incessantly  on  the  mind  of  the  young 
girl,  ended  by  making  an  impression  upon  it,  however  strong  the 
protest  of  her  own  good  sense,  as  the  constant  dropping  of  water 
finishes  by  wearing  away  even  the  hardest  rock.  This  deplorable 
ascendancy  extended  itself  over  everything,  mingled  with  every- 
thing, touched  everything.  "  Mesdames  are  not  content  to  gov- 
ern the  dauphiness  in  all  that  relates  to  her  personally,"  Mercy 
wrote ;  "  they  also  wish  to  extend  their  power  over  those  persons 
attached  to  the  service  of  her  Royal  Highness,  to  strike  a  blow  at 
their  prerogatives,  to  confound  their  ranks  and  thus  lessen  the 
very  marked  difference  which  should  exist  between  the  condition 
of  the  dauphiness  and  that  of  Mesdames  of  France."  To  confound 
the  condition  of  the  dauphiness  and  that  of  Mesdames  of  France, 
such  was  indeed  at  bottom  the  aim  of  the  daughters  of  Louis  XV. 

Despite  everything,  Marie  Antoinette,  led  on  by  her  want  of 
calculation  and  need  of  expansion,  which  was  one  of  the  charac- 
teristics of  her  disposition,  could  not  hide  from  her  aunts  either 
her  joys  or  her  hopes.  One  day,  having  received  from  the  dau- 
phin a  promise  of  intimacy  which  she  had  long  expected  and 
ardently  hoped  for,  she  could  not  keep  her  happiness  to  herself, 


56  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

but  ran  to  acquaint  Madame  Adelaide  and  Madame  Sophie  with  it. 
They,  being  gossips,  like  all  old  maids,  were  not  discreet  enough 
to  respect  the  confidence  of  the  young  wife ;  they  recounted  it 
to  so  many  persons  that  it  became  the  news  of  the  day.  The 
dauphin,  shy  and  displeased,  failed  to  keep  his  engagement,  and 
there  was  a  coolness  for  some  days  in  the  household. 

Behind  Madame  Adelaide  and  directing  her  was  her  lady  of  the 
bedchamber,  the  Comtesse  de  Narbonne,  a  woman  of  small  parts, 
according  to  Mercy,  but  well  versed  in  intrigue,  at  a  court  where 
talent  was  not  so  necessary  as  cunning  in  order  to  succeed,  and 
who  had  been  able  to  gain  great  ascendancy  over  her  mistress. 
Madame  de  Narbonne  neglected  nothing  in  order  to  attract  the 
dauphiness  and  to  obtain  the  same  influence  over  her  that  she 
had  over  Madame  Adelaide.  Either  from  indolence  of  mind  or 
need  of  amusement  and  the  facility  of  procuring  it  with  the  lady 
of  the  bedchamber,  Marie  Antoinette  ended  by  submitting  to  her 
influence.  We  soon  see  a  singular  instance  of  this. 

When  the  archduchess  left  Vienna,  her  mother  counselled  her 
to  obtain,  as  a  special  favour,  for  the  Marquis  de  Durfort,  who  had 
negotiated  her  marriage,  the  title  of  duke.  Several  times  in  her 
letters  to  her  daughter  or  in  her  correspondence  with  Mercy 
Maria  Theresa,  who  had  a  talent  for  being  grateful,  returned  to 
the  subject,  surprised  that  a  favour  so  often  granted  to  persons  of 
much  less  merit  than  the  Marquis  de  Durfort  should  be  so  long 
deferred.  And  yet  it  was  to  Marie  Antoinette's  interest  to  prove 
that  she  was  willing  to  aid  those  who  had  served  her,  and  that 
she  had  sufficient  power  to  aid  them  effectually.  But  at  every 
mention  of  the  subject  the  young  princess  put  off  the  question  :  it 
was  necessary  to  wait,  the  opportunity  was  not  favourable,  etc. 
She  had  indeed  spoken  of  it  to  Choiseul,  but  she  dared  not  broach 
it  to  the  king.  The  truth  was  that  Madame  Adelaide  opposed 
having  the  Marquis  de  Durfort  created  duke  because  the  glory  of 
that  title  would  in  a  manner  redound  to  the  credit  of  her  younger 
sister,  Madame  Victoire,  whose  lady  of  the  bedchamber  was  the 
Marquise  de  Durfort.  This  was  also  at  the  time  when  Mesdames 
Adelaide  and  Sophie  were  seeking  to  estrange  the  dauphiness 
from  their  sister,  whose  affectionate  and  more  gentle  nature 
threw  them  into  the  sh^de. 

Then  there  was  a  sudden  change  through  one  of  those  shiftings 
of  scenes,  or  rather  by  one  of  those  compromises,  which  we  often 
see  at  court,  but  which  are  not  entirely  peculiar,  so  far  as  we  know, 


THE    KING   AND    MARIE   ANTOINETTE.  57 

to  a  monarchical  form  of  government.  The  bishop  of  Gap, 
brother-in-law  of  the  Comtesse  de  Xarbonne,  ardently  desired  to 
be  made  grand  almoner  to  Madame  Victoire;  the  Marquise  de 
Durfort,  who  had  as  great  ascendancy  over  her  as  the  Comtesse 
de  Xarbonne  over  Madame  Adelaide,  persuaded  her  to  refuse  the 
nomination  to  the  bishop  so  long  as  she  herself  had  not  received 
satisfaction.  Madame  Victoire  yielded  to  her  representations, 
and  the  two  ladies  of  the  bedchamber  found  themselves  in  the 
position  of  being  mutually  in  need  of  each  other.  They  capitu- 
lated, owing  to  the  efforts  of  their  common  friends ;  and  it  was 
agreed  that  the  Comtesse  de  Narbonne  should  get  Madame  Ade- 
laide to  speak  to  the  dauphiness  in  behalf  of  the  Marquis  de  Dur- 
fort, and  that  the  latter  should  induce  Madame  Victoire  to  accept 
the  bishop  of  Gap  as  grand  almoner.  This  agreement  was  re- 
ligiously observed  ;  and  the  first  result  of  it  was  that  the  bishop  of 
Gap  was  called  for  and  made  grand  almoner  to  Mesdames  Victoire 
and  Sophie.  Immediately  afterward  Madame  Adelaide  having 
announced  her  consent  that  the  dauphiness  should  use  her 
good  offices  in  favour  of  the  Marquis  de  Durfort,  her  Royal 
Highness  undertook  the  mission  and  spoke  to  the  king  concern- 
ing it  on  the  6th  of  that  month.  The  king  received  the  dau- 
phiness's  petition  graciously,  and  answered  without  the  slightest 
hesitation  that  the  request  being  a  legitimate  one,  and  the 
dauphiness  desiring  it,  he  gladly  granted  it ;  he  then  commanded 
the  Due  de  la  Vrilliere  to  send  to  the  Marquis  de  Durfort  an 
assurance  in  writing  by  means  of  which  both  he  and  his  posterity 
should  enjoy  the  dignity  of  duke  and  peer  on  the  extinction,  soon 
to  take  place,  of  the  branch  of  Lorge ;  this  satisfied  the  demand 
of  the  Marquis  de  Durfort. 

Louis  XV.  sincerely  loved  the  dauphiness;  her  good-humour, 
grace,  even  her  petulance,  though  sometimes  audacious,  pleased 
him.  On  several  occasions  his  tenderness  for  her  had  been 
marked.  One  day,  while  out  hunting,  he  got  into  her  carriage 
and  placed  her  affectionately  upon  his  knee. 

Another  time,  at  Fontainebleau,  he  went  to  her  apartment  in 
the  morning  in  his  dressing-gown,  entering  by  a  door  hitherto 
locked,  drank  his  coffee  there  and  remained  two  hours,  and 
seemed  gayer  and  happier  than  usual.  Tired  of  everything,  sick 
of  his  culpable  pleasures,  it  seemed  as  if  he  sought  in  that  purer  at- 
mosphere a  refuge  from  himself;  and  it  would  have  been  easy  for 
Marie  Antoinette  to  accustom  her  grandfather  to  come  regularly 


58  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

to  her  apartment,  and  to  have  thus  gained  an  enduring  dominion 
over  that  mind  so  easy  to  conquer  by  reason  of  its  lassitude.  It 
would  only  have  been  necessary  for  her  to  be  herself  and  to  yield 
to  her  first  impulse. 

Unfortunately  Mesdames  set  themselves  to  work  to  inspire  her 
with  the  same  fear  and  taciturnity  that  they  experienced  in  the 
presence  of  their  father.  Under  their  malign  influence  the  young 
girl  found  herself  embarrassed  when  with  the  king,  and  in  her 
embarrassment  remained  silent.  When  she  had  a  favour  to  ask, 
she  preferred  to  write  ;  and  Louis  XV.,  who  would  not  have  dared 
refuse  when  brought  face  to  face,  being  himself  timid  before  his 
children,  denied  by  letter  what  he  would  have  granted  to  an  oral 
request.  Finding  that  she  did  not  respond  to  his  overtures,  he 
ended  by  feeling  hurt ;  he  said  nothing,  because  he  was  too  indo- 
lent, but  he  vented  his  displeasure  in  fits  of  sullenness  and  cold- 
ness. Nor  did  matters  improve.  Mercy  in  vain  represented  to 
the  dauphiness  how  easy  it  would  be  for  her  to  profit  by  the 
friendly  inclinations  of  her  grandfather,  who  would  like  nothing 
better  than  to  devote  himself  to  his  children  provided  that  they 
on  their  part  would  try  to  lessen  his  ennui.  The  dauphiness  ad- 
mitted it,  but  concluded  by  saying  that  she  lacked  the  courage  to 
talk  to  the  king.  "  I  have  believed  it  my  duty  to  omit  nothing," 
Mercy  wrote  in  reporting  this  conversation  to  the  empress,  "  to 
the  end  that  your  Majesty  might  see  to  what  degree  the  counsels 
of  Madame  Adelaide  have  enervated  the  dauphiness." 

Maria  Theresa  became  alarmed  at  this  persistent  influence 
which  had  such  fatal  results  for  her  daughter,  and  interfered  with 
her  own  plans  both  as  mother  and  sovereign. 

"  Every  letter  informs  me,"  she  wrote,  "  that  you  are  governed  entirely 
by  your  aunts.  I  esteem  them,  I  love  them  ;  but  they  have  never  known 
how  to  make  themselves  either  esteemed  or  loved  by  their  family  or  the 
public,  and  you  wish  to  follow  in  their  footsteps  !  " 

And  then  proudly  drawing  a  parallel  between  what  Mesdames 
were  and  what  she  was,  she  continued :  — 

"Do  my  counsels,  my  affection,  deserve  a  smaller  return  than  theirs? 
I  acknowledge  that  this  thought  cuts  me  to  the  heart.  Compare  the  part, 
the  approbation,  that  they  have  received  from  the  world  and  —  I  am  loath 
to  say  it  —  the  role  that  I  have  played.  You  should  then  give  me  the 
preference  if  I  prophesy  or  counsel  differently  from  them.  I  do  not  wish 
to  compare  myself  in  any  way  with  these  estimable  princesses,  whose  dis- 


END   OF   MESDAMES'   INFLUENCE.  59 

positions  and  good  qualities  I  admire ;  but  I  must  ever  repeat  that  they 
have  not  been  able  to  gain  the  esteem  of  the  public  nor  the  love  of  indi- 
viduals. By  reason  of  their  easy  nature  and  the  habit  of  being  ruled  by 
some  one  else,  they  have  made  themselves  disliked,  disagreeable,  and 
wearisome,  and  the  object  of  vexatious  intrigues.  I  see  you  following  the 
same  course,  and  must  say  nothing  !  I  love  you  too  well  to  be  able  or 
willing  to  do  so,  and  your  affected  silence  on  this  point  has  distressed  me 
and  gives  me  little  hope  that  you  will  change  !  " 

There  came  a  change,  however.  Little  by  little  Marie  Antoi- 
nette, enlightened  by  Mercy's  warnings  and  her  mother's  scold- 
ing, came  to  value  the  counsels  of  her  aunts  more  justly.  She 
did  not  break  with  them  at  once;  she  could  not  brusquely  sunder 
the  ties  which  her  age  and  her  loneliness  had  led  her  to  form,  and 
which  daily  intercourse  had  strengthened.  But  her  confidence  in 
them  was  gone. 

Out  of  respect  and  habit  she  still  paid  some  heed  to  the  advice 
of  her  former  counsellors;  but  from  the  middle  of  1772  it  is 
easy  to  perceive  that  the  old  princesses'  influence  was  on  the 
wane.  If  Marie  Antoinette  yielded  to  them  now  and  then,  it  was 
rather  from  good-nature  or  fear  than  from  conviction. 

Three  months  later  Mercy  acknowledges  that  they  are  no 
longer  consulted  about  anything,  not  even  regarding  the  minor 
arrangements  of  the  day,  of  which  formerly  they  were  the  arbi- 
ters. At  the  beginning  of  1773  the  relation  of  the  dauphiness  to 
her  aunts  is  what  it  should  be,  —  a  simple  observance  of  civilities ; 
she  showed  them  the  proper  and  fitting  consideration,  but  she 
was  no  longer  intimate  with  them.  The  sway  of  Mesdames  was 
past. 

The  old  princesses  did  not  bear  cheerfully  the  loss  of  the  small 
despotism  which  they  had  exercised  over  their  niece  and  through 
her  over  the  rest  of  the  family.  They  manifested  their  displeasure 
in  criticisms,  cavilling,  and  sharp  speeches,  and  in  seeking  to 
exalt,  to  the  detriment  of  Marie  Antoinette,  their  new  sister-in- 
law,  the  Comtesse  de  Provence ;  they  were  unsuccessful.  Then, 
changing  their  tactics,  they  tried  to  ally  themselves  once  more 
to  Marie  Antoinette ;  they  made  overtures  to  her,  were  obliging 
where  they  had  before  been  dictatorial,  and  even  besought  the 
interposition  of  the  Abbe  de  Vermond.  Balked  in  these  efforts 
and  kept  at  a  distance  by  the  conduct,  wisely  unmoved,  of  the 
dauphiness,  they  finished,  after  some  moments  of  anger  and  a 
few  sharp  contests  in  which  they  did  not  come  off  best,  by  re- 


60  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

signing  themselves  to  the  incontestable  supremacy  of  their  niece  ; 
but  they  chafed  under  it,  and  their  concentrated  hate,  constantly 
escaping,  like  a  stream  of  poisonous  mist,  in  cutting  remarks  and 
malicious  insinuations,  became  a  formidable  danger  to  the  daugh- 
ter of  Maria  Theresa.  Their  hands,  unskilled  in  any  great  matter, 
but  deft  at  petty  intrigues,  had  a  share  in  the  weaving  of  every 
plot  contrived  against  the  young  princess.  Being  no  longer  able 
to  rule  the  dauphiness,  they  resolved  to  destroy  the  queen,  and 
unfortunately  succeeded.  Their  influence  had  been  pernicious ; 
their  spite  was  fatal.  To  cite  only  one  instance,  it  was  Madame 
Adelaide  who  inflicted  the  nickname  of  the  "  Austrian  "  on  her 
niece,  the  unpopularity  of  which  weighed  on  Marie  Antoinette 
during  her  whole  life,  and  after  having  brought  her  to  the  scaf- 
fold, rested  upon  her  memory  until  history,  better  understood, 
meted  out  justice  to  the  malice  of  old  maids  and  the  pamphlets 
of  gazetteers. 


CHAPTER    VI. 

DISGRACE  OF  THE  Due  DE  CHOISEUL  ;  HIS  TRIUMPHANT  EXILE  ;  HIS 
CHARACTER.  —  FALL  OF  THE  PARLIAMENTS.  —  DISCONTENT  OF  THE 
PEOPLE.  —  THE  Due  D'AIGUILLON.  —  THE  COMTESSE  DU  BARRY.  — 
THE  PROUD  ATTITUDE  OF  THE  DAUPHINESS  TOWARD  THE  FAVOUR- 
UK. —  THE  KING  is  DISPLEASED  BY  IT.  —  REMONSTRANCES  FROM 
MARIA  THERESA.  —  LETTER  FROM  KAUNITZ  TO  MERCY. —  DIRECT 
INTERVENTION  OF  Louis  XV. —  INSISTENCE  ON  THE  PART  OF  THE 
EMPRESS. —  LIVELY  LETTERS  EXCHANGED  BETWEEN  MOTHER  AND 
DAUGHTER.  —  MADAME  DU  BARRY  SEEKS  TO  PROPITIATE  THE  DAU- 
PHINESS; SHE  FAILS. —  IN  THIS  CONFLICT,  HISTORY  SHOWS  MARIE 

ANTOINETTE  TO  HAVE  BEEN  ix  THE  RIGHT. 

ON  the  the  24th  of  December,   1770,  the  Due  de  Choiseul, 
prime  minister  of  France,  if  not  in  title,  at  least  in  fact, 
received  from  the  king  the  following  note :  — 

I  order  my  cousin,  the  Due  de  Choiseul,  to  place  his  dismission  from 
the  office  of  Secretary  of  State  and  Superintendent  of  the  Post,  in  the 
hands  of  the  Due  de  la  Vrilliere,  and  to  withdraw  to  Chanteloup  until  fur- 
ther orders  from  me.  Louis. 

VERSAILLES,  this  24th  day  of  December,  1770. 

The  duke  learned  of  his  disgrace  with  imperturbable  coolness. 
He  set  out  immediately  for  Paris,  where  he  found  the  duchess, 
who  had  just  seated  herself  at  table.  On  seeing  him  enter,  she 
said  to  him  :  "  You  have  indeed  the  air  of  a  man  in  exile ;  but  sit 
down ;  our  dinner  will  be  none  the  less  good."  They  dined  in 
fact  very  tranquilly ;  and  on  the  following  day  the  Due  de  Choiseul 
with  his  wife  and  his  sister,  the  Duchesse  de  Gramont,  departed 
for  his  estate  in  Touraine.  A  contemporary  writes :  "  The  people 
of  Paris  lined  the  streets  from  his  palace  to  the  D'Enfer  boundary, 
overwhelming  him  with  laudatory  acclamations,  which  made  such 
an  impression  on  this  minister,  who  had  never  been  popular,  that 
he  exclaimed  with  tears  in  his  eyes,  '  This  is  something  that  I 
have  not  deserved.' " 


62  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

His  departure  from  Paris  and  from  Versailles  had  been  an 
ovation;  his  sojourn  at  Chanteloup  was  a  triumph.  Both  the 
court  and  the  city,  as  it  was  then  said,  betook  itself  thither; 
there  was  hardly  a  great  noble,  a  fashionable  woman,  or  a  man 
in  office,  who  did  not  feel  bound  in  honour  to  go  to  pay  their 
respects  to  the  exile,  and  the  king,  who  at  bottom  perhaps 
missed  his  minister,  shut  his  eyes  to  this  striking  protest,  which 
was  ill  disguised  under  the  pretence  of  paying  homage  to 
misfortune. 

Of  a  volatile  mind,  but  broad  and  perspicacious,  an  inconsistent 
politician,  but  possessed  of  large  views,  witty,  elegant,  magnificent 
to  prodigality,  confident  to  presumption,  bold  to  audacity,  proud 
to  haughtiness,  a  generous  enemy,  a  devoted  friend,  regarded 
with  favour  by  women,  feared  by  diplomats,  holding  high  the 
honour  of  France,  the  Due  de  Choiseul  possessed  great  qualities 
and  great  defects,  and  perhaps  it  would  be  but  true  to  say  that 
he  was  more  loved  because  of  his  defects  than  his  qualities.  Some 
one  has  written  of  him  that  he  elevated  "  indiscretion  into  frank- 
ness, insolence  to  dignity,  frivolity  to  independence."  However 
unfortunate  certain  acts  of  his  administration  may  have  been,  it  is 
none  the  less  certain  that,  in  the  midst  of  the  enervated  society  of 
the  reign  of  Louis  XV.,  Choiseul  was  a  character,  and  that  he  dis- 
played under  various  circumstances  genuine  talent  as  a  statesman. 
In  the  full  swing  of  the  eighteenth  century,  at  a  time  when  the 
general  opinion  was  one  of  praise  for  Frederick  II.,  his  foresight 
discerned  the  menace  of  that  Prussian  power  which  was  still  so 
young  and  yet  so  insidious ;  and  he  found  in  the  alliance  with 
Austria  the  means  to  check  its  encroachments,  the  danger  of  which 
the  future  has  but  too  plainly  proved  to  us. 

He  had  gained  such  an  ascendancy  over  foreign  courts,  espe- 
cially over  that  of  Spain,  that  he  said  himself  he  was  more  sure  of 
his  power  in  the  cabinet  at  Madrid  than  in  the  one  at  Versailles. 
But  his  very  haughtiness  left  him  without  defence  against  the 
intrigues  that  were  hatched  against  him.  "  One  never  saw  him," 
so  writes  a  contemporary,  "  stoop  to  vile  court  intrigues,  nor  to 
manage  and  flatter  the  valets."  He  despised  his  enemies  from 
pride,  and  spared  them  from  generosity.  It  was  this  that  ruined 
him.  His  pride  refused  to  bow  the  knee  before  the  idol  of  the 
day,  Madame  du  Barry.  There  resulted  from  this  at  first  "  petty 
dislikes,  grimaces,  sarcasms,  shrugging  of  shoulders,  and  finally 
the  petty  vengeance  of  a  schoolgirl." 


CHOISEUL'S    EXILE.  63 

Choiseul  laughed  at  this,  and  his  friends  laughed  with  him. 
His  position  seemed  secure;  the  king  esteemed  and  loved  him. 
"  You  manage  my  affairs  very  well ;  I  am  content  with  you,"  he 
had  written  to  him.  The  marriage  of  the  dauphin  and  the  arrival 
of  Marie  Antoinette  in  France  had  served  to  strengthen  the  influ- 
ence of  the  minister.  The  favourite  herself  had  no  personal  ani- 
mosity against  him.  "  She  does  not  hate  you  in  the  least,"  Louis 
XV.  added ;  "  she  recognizes  your  intelligence,  and  wishes  you 
no  ill."  This  letter  from  the  royal  lover,  obviously  dictated  by  his 
mistress,  shows  beyond  doubt  on  her  part  a  desire  for  a  recon- 
ciliation. Choiseul,  always  haughty,  repelled  her  advances;  he 
contented  himself  with  replying  that  he  would  grant  all  demands 
of  Madame  du  Barry  which  he  thought  just. 

But  he  could  not  prevent  those  about  him,  nor  refrain  himself, 
from  indulging  in  open  and  witty  pleasantry  on  the  subject  of  the 
favourite.  He  even  ventured  to  make  some  bold  remarks  about 
her  to  the  king. 

The  king  was  hurt:  he  gave  ear  to  the  enemies  of  the  min- 
ister. They  represented  that  Choiseul  was  in  league  with  the 
Parliaments,  then  struggling  against  the  chancellor,  and  was  seek- 
ing his  own  advantage  in  entangling  France  in  a  war  between 
England  and  Spain.  The  Prince  de  Conde  and  Maupeou  joined 
in  the  plot,  and  Madame  du  Barry  threw  the  overpowering  weight 
of  her  influence  into  the  scales  against  him. 

Louis  XV.  yielded,  and  sent  to  the  minister  by  the  Due  de  la 
Vrilliere  the  note  which  we  have  quoted  above.  Choiseul  de- 
parted :  one  mistress  had  raised  him  up ;  another  overthrew  him. 

Externally  his  fall  changed  nothing.  Although  he  was  the 
most  determined  upholder  of  the  Austrian  alliance  among  the 
members  of  the  cabinet  at  Versailles,  the  king  was  not  less  in 
favour  of  it  than  he.  According  to  the  Comte  de  Broglie  it  was 
his  favourite  scheme,  and  he  would  not  hear  of  abandoning  it. 
But  in  reality  his  fall  meant  the  triumph  of  the  party  opposed  to 
Marie  Antoinette.  Maria  Theresa,  who  had  no  fears  for  the  alli- 
ance, was  extremely  uneasy  for  her  daughter.  Might  they  not 
try  to  remove  from  her  her  faithful  counsellors,  Mercy  and  Ver- 
mond?  Might  not  the  young  princess,  with  her  vivacity,  which 
was  little  inclined  to  reflection,  express  too  openly  her  sympathies 
with  the  fallen  minister?  Or,  on  the  other  hand,  left  to  herself 
and  lacking  discretion,  would  she  not  be  spoiled  by  that  "  abomi- 
nable set"?  These  fears  of  the  empress  were  vain;  guided  by 


64  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Mercy,  the  young  dauphiness  behaved  irreproachably  in  that 
delicate  crisis  ;  but  the  danger  was  none  the  less  real. 

The  fall  of  the  Parliament  soon  followed  that  of  Choiseul. 
During  the  night  of  the  2Oth  and  2ist  of  January,  1771,  one  hun- 
dred and  sixty  presidents  or  councillors  were  exiled ;  on  the 
I4th  of  April  a  bed  of  justice,  solemnly  held  at  Versailles, 
suppressed  Parliament  and  replaced  it  by  a  new  assembly  com- 
posed for  the  most  part  of  members  of  the  Great  Council.  There 
was  a  great  uproar  in  the  whole  kingdom ;  at  Paris  as  at  Ver- 
sailles, every  one  openly  took  the  part  of  the  exiles ;  the  princes 
of  the  blood,  with  the  exception  of  the  Comte  de  la  Marche,  re- 
fused to  assist  at  the  bed  of  justice.  Even  the  women  took 
part  in  it ;  and  the  public  disregarded  all  bounds  in  its  remarks. 
At  the  court  the  intrigues  and  the  excitement  were  not  less 
general.  "  It  is  impossible  for  your  Majesty  to  form  any  exact 
idea  of  the  horrible  confusion  that  reigns  here,"  Mercy  wrote  to 
Maria  Theresa.  "  The  throne  is  disgraced  by  the  indecency  and 
growing  credit  of  the  favourite  and  the  wickedness  of  her  par- 
tisans. The  nation  gives  forth  seditious  speech  and  incendiary 
writings  in  which  the  person  of  the  monarch  is  by  no  means 
spared.  Versailles  has  become  the  abode  of  perfidy,  hate,  and 
vengeance ;  everything  is  done  by  intrigue  and  personal  interest ; 
and  it  would  seem  as  though  every  one  had  renounced  all  senti- 
ment of  honour." 

Choiseul  was  overthrown ;  and  he  was  not  replaced.  The 
chiefs  of  the  opposite  party  were  divided  upon  the  choice  of  his 
successor.  The  favourite  desired  the  Due  d'Aiguillon;  the 
Prince  de  Conde  was  opposed  to  him ;  the  chancellor  was 
indifferent;  and  the  king  hesitated.  D'Aiguillon  had  made  him- 
self conspicuous  by  his  long  and  violent  contests  with  the  Par- 
liament of  Bretagne,  in  which  he  had  not  come  off  with  his 
reputation  for  honesty  and  valour  intact.  This  was  calumny,  but 
it  spread  none  the  less,  and  brought  the  protege  of  Madame  du 
Barry  into  discredit.  Louis  XV.  did  not  esteem  him,  and  even 
felt  for  him  a  certain  repugnance.  "  How  can  you  imagine  that 
he  can  replace  you?  "  the  king  had  written  to  Choiseul,  the  year 
before.  "Hated  as  he  is,  what  could  he  do?"  Yet  the  will  of 
the  favourite  again  triumphed  over  that  of  the  king,  and  on  the 
5th  of  June,  1771,  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  was  nominated. 

The  absolute  power  of  Madame  du  Barry  was  thus  evident  to 
all  eyes ;  and  this  open  alliance  between  the  prime  minister  and 


THE   DAUPHINESS   AND   THE    FAVOURITE.  65 

the  mistress  became  for  Marie  Antoinette  the  chief  obstacle  in 
her  path  over  the  slippery  ground  of  the  court  of  Versailles. 

This  Comtesse  du  Barry  was  not  at  bottom,  however,  a  bad- 
hearted  woman.  She  was  not  vindictive,  but  she  was  vain,  and 
all  the  more  eager  for  consideration  and  honour  in  that  she 
felt  she  did  not  deserve  them.  She  had  wished  to  be  presented, 
and  she  had  been  by  some  women  of  the  best  society ;  she  had 
wished  to  sup  with  the  dauphiness  on  her  arrival,  and  her  royal 
lover  had  had  the  cowardly  weakness  to  permit  her  to  sup  with 
the  dauphiness  on  the  very  eve  of  her  marriage.  From  the 
moment  she  set  foot  in  France  Marie  Antoinette  had  had  before 
her,  or  rather  beside  her,  this  "  stupid  and  impertinent  creature. '" 
She  had  found  her  at  La  Muette,  and  again  at  Marly,  Choisy, 
Compiegne,  Versailles,  —  everywhere.  Her  virginal  purity  re- 
volted against  this  impure  contact,  and  she  could  not  bring  her- 
self to  show  the  countess  any  mark  of  favour,  or  even  to  speak 
to  her.  The  dauphin  shared  her  repugnance,  and  did  not  hide 
it.  For  a  while  they  sought  to  lure  him  to  the  little  suppers  at 
St.  Hubert  or  at  the  Hermitage;  he  had  soon,  however,  with- 
drawn from  them,  and  on  the  advice  of  his  wife.  The  favourite 
was  vexed  at  this  attitude  of  the  young  couple ;  and  her  friends, 
having  no  further  hope  of  the  dauphiness,  tried  to  destroy  her 
credit  by  malicious  insinuations,  cutting  criticisms,  and  clever 
lies.  The  king  himself,  under  the  instigations  of  his  mistress, 
became  angry ;  but  as  he  had  a  horror  of  all  explanations  with 
his  children,  he  sent  for  the  Comtesse  de  Noailles,  and  while 
doing  justice  to  the  character  and  grace  of  his  granddaughter, 
complained  that  "  the  dauphiness  permitted  herself  to  speak  too 
freely  concerning  what  she  saw  or  thought  she  saw ;  "  and  added 
that  her  rather  hazardous  remarks  might  excite  bad  blood  within 
the  family  circle. 

This  time  Marie  Antoinette  was  able  to  conquer  her  habitual 
timidity:  she  went  to  talk  to  her  grandfather;  and  Louis  XV., 
who  dared  not  resist  an  appeal  made  in  person  or  make  any 
direct  remonstrance,  knew  not  how  to  maintain  his  displeasure. 
He  assured  his  granddaughter  that  he  found  her  charming,  that 
he  loved  her  with  all  his  heart;  he  kissed  her  hand,  embraced 
her,  and  commended  all  that  she  had  said  to  him.  For  this  time 
the  danger  was  dissipated,  the  cabal  foiled ;  and  it  would  seem 
certain  that  if  the  young  princess  had  triumphed  over  her  em- 
barrassment and  adopted  the  course  of  carrying  affairs  each 
VOL.  i.  —  5 


66  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

time  before  the  king  himself,  she  would  soon  have  done  with  all 
annoyances. 

But  it  was  at  this  very  time  that  Mesdames,  in  order  the  better 
to  influence  their  niece,  were  making  strenuous  efforts  to. estrange 
her  from  their  father ;  and  this  attitude,  while  alienating  the  old 
monarch,  left  the  field  free  for  all  intrigues.  Madame  du  Barry 
and  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  joined  forces  in  their  spite ;  and  the 
king,  caught  between  his  minister  and  his  mistress,  —  between  the 
petty  complaints  respectfully  submitted  by  the  one  and  the  bitter 
complaints  of  the  other,  —  gave  ear  to  their  accusations.  New 
insinuations  were  constantly  made  against  the  dauphiness,  new 
assaults  to  shake  her  position.  The  Comtesse  de  Provence  had 
just  arrived  at  court;  the  cabal  surrounded  her  with  attentions,  and 
sought  to  make  her  growing  credit  a  means  of  checkmating  that 
of  her  sister-in-law.  Savoy  against  Austria,  — therein  lay  a  per- 
sonal danger  for  Marie  Antoinette;  therein  lay  also  political 
peril.  Maria  Theresa  was  alarmed ;  and  at  her  instigation,  the 
Prince  von  Kaunitz  wrote  to  Mercy  a  letter  which  the  ambas- 
sador was  authorized,  or  rather  commanded,  to  lay  before  the 
young  princess. 

"  To  be  lacking  in  consideration  for  persons  whom  the  king  has  honoured 
with  office  or  with  his  society  is  to  be  lacking  in  consideration  for  himself. 
It  would  be  still  worse  to  permit  oneself  to  make  offensive  remarks.  One 
should  regard  that  sort  of  person  only  from  the  point  of  view  of  an  indi- 
vidual whom  the  king  has  found  worthy  of  his  confidence  and  favour,  and 
one  should  not  allow  oneself  to  examine  whether  it  be  right  or  wrong ;  the 
choice  alone  of  the  prince  should  be  respected ;  in  consequence  of  this 
and  out  of  respect  for  him,  one  should  show  consideration  to  that  sort  of 
person.  Prudence  demands  that  one  should  show  it  towards  them  because 
they  can  do  harm." 

And  the  old  diplomat  finished  by  making  a  plan  and  almost  by 
dictating  the  terms  of  the  discourse  which  "Madame  TArchi- 
duchesse "  should  hold  with  the  king. 

But  Kaunitz  had  to  contend  against  both  the  influence  of  Mes- 
dames and  the  repugnance  of  the  dauphiness.  His  counsel  was 
not  followed,  and  the  intrigues  continued.  One  day,  on  July  28, 
1771,  at  a  supper  given  by  the  Comtesse  de  Valentinois,  the  Due 
d'Aiguillon  took  the  Comte  de  Mercy  aside  and  informed  him 
that  the  king  desired  to  speak  with  him  on  the  day  following  the 
morrow  at  the  house  of  his  mistress.  "  You  know,"  the  prince 
had  said  to  his  minister,  "  that  I  am  not  lodged  here  in  such  a 


THE    KING    IS    DISPLEASED.  67 

way  as  to  be  able  to  see  him  at  my  ease.  Therefore  engage  him 
to  meet  me  at  Madame  du  Barry's."  Although  somewhat  sur- 
prised at  this  overture,  which  he  thought  but  a  pretext  to  get 
him  to  the  house  of  the  favourite,  Mercy  was  careful  not  to  miss 
the  appointment  on  the  3Oth.  He  first  encountered  the  countess, 
who,  with  many  protestations  of  friendship,  confided  to  him  a 
cause  for  grievance,  which  she  protested  afflicted  her  deeply. 
Some  one  had  had  recourse  to  the  most  infamous  calumnies  to 
ruin  her  in  the  opinion  of  Madame  la  Dauphine;  they  had  even 
gone  so  far  as  to  ascribe  to  her  certain  very  disrespectful  re- 
marks. Far  from  being  guilty  of  any  such  enormity,  she  had 
always  been  one  of  those  who  sang  the  merited  praises  of 
Madame  1'Archiduchesse,  and  had  never  used  her  credit  with  the 
king  but  to  persuade  him  to  grant  the  reasonable  demands  of 
the  dauphiness ;  and  yet  the  princess  always  treated  her  with  a 
sort  of  contempt.  Mercy,  somewhat  annoyed  at  these  declara- 
tions, was  professing  ignorance,  and  treating  as  exaggerations 
these  complaints  of  the  countess,  when  Louis  XV.  himself  arrived 
by  a  secret  staircase.  "Until  now,"  he  said,  "you  have  been 
the  ambassador  of  the  empress;  I  now  beg  you  to  be  my  ambas- 
sador, at  least  for  a  time."  Then  in  detail,  but  not  without  a 
certain  embarrassment,  he  related  his  grievances  against  the 
dauphiness.  He  found  her  charming;  but  being  young  and 
lively,  and  having  a  husband  who  was  not  able  to  guide  her,  it 
was  impossible  for  her  to  escape  the  traps  that  were  set  for  her : 
she  espoused  the  prejudices  and  enmities  which  were  suggested 
to  her;  she  ill-treated,  even  to  affectation,  persons  whom  he 
admitted  to  his  intimate  circle.  Such  conduct  would  occasion 
scenes  at  court  and  excite  party  spirit  and  intrigue.  "  Go  to  see 
the  dauphiness  often,"  continued  the  king;  "I  authorize  you  to 
say  to  her  whatever  you  wish  as  coming  from  me.  She  has  bad 
counsellors ;  she  need  not  follow  their  advice."  And  when 
Mercy  observed  that  these  remonstrances  coming  from  the 
king  himself  would  have  greater  weight  with  his  granddaughter, 
who  would  certainly  show  an  affectionate  eagerness  to  obey 
him,  the  prince  alleged  his  repugnance  to  having  explanations 
with  his  children,  and  begged  the  ambassador  to  undertake  this 
mission.  "You  see  what  confidence  I  have  in  you,"  he  added, 
"  since  I  lay  bare  before  you  my  thoughts  concerning  my 
family  affairs." 

A  strange  and  instructive  picture  !    What  is  one  to  think  of  that 


68  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

old  monarch  who  had  the  regrettable  courage  to  make  himself  the 
instrument  of  the  caprices  and  spites  of  his  mistress  before  his 
children,  yet  who  did  not  dare  avow  it  to  them,  and  fell  back 
upon  the  good-nature  of  a  foreign  minister  to  make  known  his 
wishes  to  his  family? 

However,  Mercy  was  too  devoted  to  the  dauphiness,  and  saw 
too  clearly  the  intrigue  which  was  being  woven  about  her,  not  to 
warn  her  of  it  at  once.  He  sought  her  on  the  3ist,  recounted  to 
her  the  scene  of  the  preceding  day,  and  insisted  upon  the  neces- 
sity of  promptly  deciding  upon  her  course  of  action. 

"  If  Madame  1'Archiduchesse  wishes  to  show  openly  by  her  conduct  that 
she  knows  what  role  the  Comtesse  du  Barry  plays  at  court,  her  dignity  re- 
quires that  she  should  request  the  king  to  forbid  the  woman  from  appearing 
for  the  future  in  the  court  circle.  If,  on  the  contrary,  she  wishes  to  ignore 
the  true  position  of  the  favourite,  which  is  what  Kaunitz  advises,  it  is  ne- 
cessary to  treat  her  unaffectedly  like  any  other  lady  who  has  been  presented, 
and  when  occasion  offers  to  speak  to  her,  even  if  it  be  but  once,  which 
would  put  an  end  to  all  specious  pretexts  for  complaints.  It  is  not  less 
urgent  to  speak  to  the  king,  and  to  complain  gently  of  his  having  trans- 
mitted his  wishes  to  his  granddaughter  by  means  of  a  third  person,  instead 
of  communicating  them  to  her  himself.  Such  a  step  would  certainly  em- 
barrass the  prince ;  and  in  order  to  avoid  a  similar  dilemma  in  the  future, 
he  would  be  less  ready  to  lend  himself  to  the  suggestions  of  the  party  in 
power.  Moreover,  it  would  be  wise  to  consult  the  dauphin  on  this  sub- 
ject, but  under  no  circumstances  to  follow  the  advice  of  Mesdames." 

There  was  great  commotion  in  the  little  circle  of  the  dau- 
phiness at  this  news :  the  dauphin  approved  of  Mercy's  advice, 
but  Mesdames  protested ;  and  Marie  Antoinette,  who  at  that 
time  blindly  obeyed  her  aunts,  despite  the  ambassador,  and  who, 
moreover,  felt  an  extreme  repugnance  to  the  step  which  was  re- 
quired of  her,  —  Marie  Antoinette  did  what  most  people  do  in 
embarrassing  situations :  she  adopted  but  part  of  the  plan  pro- 
posed to  her;  she  consented  to  speak  a  word  to  Madame  du 
Barry,  but  she  obstinately  refused  to  speak  to  the  king.  "  My 
aunts,"  said  she,  "  do  not  wish  it." 

The  favourite  was  to  come  to  court  on  August  n;  it  was 
decided  that  when  they  had  finished  at  cards  the  ambassador 
should  enter  into  conversation  with  her ;  the  dauphiness  should 
approach  and  casually  address  a  word  to  the  countess.  On  the 
day  appointed  everything  seemed  destined  to  pass  off  as  had 
been  agreed  upon.  The  young  princess  was  somewhat  fright- 


MARIA    THERESA'S    REMONSTRANCES.  69 

ened,  but  determined.  All  went  well  at  the  beginning.  After 
the  games  Mercy  addressed  Madame  du  Barry,  and  the  dau- 
phiness  began  to  make  the  round  of  the  circle.  She  was  just 
approaching  the  favourite  when  Madame  Adelaide,  who  had  not 
lost  sight  of  her,  raised  her  voice  and  said,  "  It  is  time  for  us 
to  retire.  Come ;  let  us  go  and  wait  for  the  king  in  my  sister 
Victoire's  apartment."  At  this  the  dauphiness  lost  courage; 
she  withdrew,  confused,  and  the  plan  failed.  The  favourite  was 
hurt;  Louis  XV.  was  displeased ;  impatient  to  know  what  recep- 
tion his  mistress  had  met  with,  he  came  to  inquire  on  leaving 
the  council  of  state.  "  Well,  Monsieur  de  Mercy,"  he  said  to 
the  ambassador,  "your  scheme  has  not  borne  fruit;  I  must  come 
to  your  aid." 

The  ambassador  was  frightened  at  the  evident  ill-humour  of 
the  king ;  he  feared  lest  his  resentment  might  lead  him  to  some 
step  disadvantageous  to  his  children,  and  to  prevent  any  outbreak 
he  made  a  pressing  appeal  to  the  supreme  authority,  —  to  Maria 
Theresa.  The  empress,  who  until  then  had  never  broached  this 
delicate  subject  in  her  correspondence  with  her  daughter,  broke 
forth  into  severe  reproaches  :  — 

"  Confess  that  your  embarrassment,  your  fear  to  say  even  good-day,  or 
a  word  about  a  dress,  or  any  other  trifle,  is  nothing  but  affectation,  pure 
affectation,  or  worse.  You  have  allowed  yourself  to  fall  into  such  bondage 
that  neither  your  reason  nor  your  duty  is  strong  enough  to  guide  you. 
I  cannot  keep  silent  longer ;  after  your  conversation  with  Mercy,  and  all 
that  he  told  you  the  king  desired,  and  which  it  was  your  duty  to  fulfil, 
that  you  should  have  dared  to  fail  him  !  What  good  reason  have  you  to 
give  ?  None.  You  should  not  regard  the  Du  Barry  in  any  other  light 
than  as  a  lady  admitted  to  the  court  and  to  the  society  of  the  king.  You 
are  his  first  subject ;  you  owe  him  obedience  and  submission  ;  you  owe 
an  example  to  the  court,  to  the  courtiers,  who  should  execute  the  wishes 
of  their  master.  If  indignities  or  familiarities  were  exacted  from  you, 
neither  I  nor  any  one  else  would  counsel  you  to  grant  them ;  but  an  indif- 
ferent word,  a  little  consideration,  not  for  the  lady,  but  for  your  grand- 
father, your  master,  your  benefactor  !  And  yet  you  fail  him  on  the  first 
occasion  that  offers  for  you  to  oblige  him  and  show  him  your  affection,  — 
an  occasion  which  may  not  return  again  so  soon.  .  .  .  You  are  afraid  to 
speak  to  the  king,  and  you  are  not  afraid  to  disobey  and  disoblige  him  ! 
I  think  I  shall  release  you  for  the  present  from  any  verbal  explanation 
with  him,  but  I  demand  that  you  should  convince  him  by  your  conduct 
of  your  respect  and  of  your  tenderness  by  doing  on  every  occasion  what 
will  please  him  ;  and  see  that  you  leave  nothing  for  him  to  desire  on  this 


70  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

point,  no  antagonism  in  example  or  discourse.  Even  should  you  embroil 
yourself  with  every  one  else,  I  cannot  spare  you  this ;  you  have  but  one 
object,  and  that  is  to  please  and  obey  the  will  of  the  king ;  if  you  conduct 
yourself  thus,  I  shall  release  you  for  a  certain  time  from  the  obligation  of 
any  verbal  explanation  with  the  king." 

It  is  difficult  not  to  feel  that  this  great  consideration  for  the 
respect  due  to  the  royal  majesty  was  somewhat  strange  under  the 
circumstances,  when  the  royal  majesty  was  showing  so  little 
respect  for  itself.  Under  whatever  paraphrases  the  thought  was 
veiled,  the  whole  tenor  of  it  was  this,  —  and  Maria  Theresa  was 
ready  to  sacrifice  a  verbal  explanation  with  the  king  to  this  press- 
ing necessity,  —  that  she  should  speak  to  a  woman  whose  presence 
at  the  court  was  a  public  scandal ;  for  to  separate  the  mistress 
from  the  lady  who  had  been  presented  was  singularly  subtle  but 
scarcely  practicable.  However,  if  one  word  had  sufficed,  but 
no !  "  If  you  were  in  a  position  to  see,  as  I  do,  all  that  occurs 
here,"  Marie  Antoinette  replied,  "  you  would  know  that  this 
woman  and  her  set  will  never  be  content  with  a  word,  and  that  it 
will  always  be  beginning  again.  I  do  not  say  that  I  shall  never 
speak  to  her,  but  I  cannot  agree  to  speak  to  her  at  a  given  time 
in  order  that  she  may  boast  of  it  beforehand  and  triumph." 

Marie  Antoinette  was  right.  Madame  du  Barry  had  the  auda- 
city and  the  passions  of  the  class  whence  she  was  sprung.  New 
instances  repeatedly  confirmed  this.  At  the  suppers  in  the  little 
chateau  over  which  she  presided,  she  had  pushed  her  insolence 
so  far  as  to  try  to  sit  beside  the  dauphin;  she  sought  to  multi- 
ply her  visits  to  the  dauphiness ;  she  had  a  pavilion  built  which 
overlooked  a  garden  hitherto  reserved  for  the  royal  family;  she 
arrogated  the  right  of  disposing  of  all  the  offices  in  the  house- 
holds of  the  princes.  At  the  marriage  of  the  Comte  d'Artois 
she  revived. the  scandal  which  had  arisen  at  the  marriage  of  the 
dauphiness;  she  dined  in  public  with  the  royal  family,  and  wore 
at  this  dinner  gems  worth  five  millions.  She  even  went  further: 
the  Due  d'Aiguillon,  in  concert  with  Madame  Louise,  whom  one 
is  astonished  to  find  involved  in  this  intrigue,  sought  to  obtain 
from  the  Pope  the  annulment  of  the  marriage  of  Madame  du 
Barry  in  order  that  she  might  be  in  a  position  to  marry  the  king; 
she  would  have  been  a  strange  Maintenon  to  a  strange  Louis 
XIV.  "If  the  empress  saw  all  that  occurs  here,"  Marie  Antoi- 
nette said,  "she  would  pardon  me.  No  one  would  have  the 
patience  to  stand  it." 


Madame  du  Barry. 


LETTERS    BETWEEN    MOTHER   AND    DAUGHTER.          71 

But  these  very  encroachments,  this  all-powerful  ascendancy  of 
the  favourite,  constituted  in  themselves  a  permanent  peril.  Ma- 
dame du  Barry  had  too  little  intelligence  and  character  to  be  dan- 
gerous in  herself.  She  was  so  by  reason  of  those  who  surrounded 
her,  whose  remarks  she  repeated  —  it  is  Mercy  who  tells  us  — 
with  the  docility  and  cleverness  of  a  parrot.  Moreover,  her  van- 
ity led  her  to  profit  by  any  momentary  advantage  and  by  her 
incontestable  empire  over  the  feeble  monarch.  To  make  her 
resentment  felt  by  some  public  demonstration,  was  this  not  to 
prove  her  power  to  all?  Mercy  feared  the  many  despicable  per- 
sons who,  having  nothing  to  hope  for  in  the  future,  had  no  reason 
to  respect  anything  in  the  present.  He  was  afraid  above  all  of  the 
Due  d'Aiguillon,  who,  he  said,  "  shows  himself  more  and  more  to 
be  a  slanderer  who  is  to  be  feared."  He  did  not  cease  to  urge 
the  dauphiness  to  adopt  a  more  politic  attitude  toward  the  ruling 
party.  His  success  was  small;  there  was  in  the  heart  of  the 
young  princess  a  virginal  revolt  against  anything  that  might  seem 
like  a  mark  of  condescension  toward  that  "  creature."  One  day, 
however,  on  Jan.  I,  1772,  in  passing  before  the  favourite,  she  let 
fall  a  word  which  might  seem  to  be  addressed  to  her.  Mercy 
triumphed,  but  his  triumph  was  of  short  duration.  "  I  have 
spoken  once,"  Marie  Antoinette  said  to  him  on  the  following  day, 
"  but  I  am  determined  to  let  it  stop  there ;  and  that  woman  shall 
not  hear  the  sound  of  my  voice  again." 

To  speak  once  to  that  woman  whom  she  despised  so  supremely 
was  an  immense  sacrifice,  and  it  seemed  to  her  that  her  mother 
and  the  ambassador  should  be  satisfied. 

"  I  do  not  doubt,"  she  wrote  to  Maria  Theresa,  "  that  Mercy 
has  told  you  of  my  behaviour  on  New  Year's  Day,  and  I  hope 
that  you  are  content.  You  may  be  sure  that  I  shall  always  sac- 
rifice my  prejudices  and  repugnances  so  long  as  nothing  conspic- 
uous and  contrary  to  honour  is  proposed  to  me." 

The  empress  bounded  beneath  this  lash. 

"  You  make  me  laugh  when  you  imagine  that  I  or  my  minister  could 
ever  give  you  any  advice  contrary  to  honour ;  nay,  not  even  contrary  to 
the  least  decorum.  See  by  these  tokens  how  much  the  prejudices  and 
bad  counsels  of  your  friends  have  gained  ascendancy  over  your  mind. 
Your  agitation  after  those  few  words,  your  remark  that  you  will  not  say 
anything  further,  make  me  tremble  for  you.  What  interest  should  I  have 
but  your  welfare  and  that  of  your  position,  the  happiness  of  the  dauphin 
and  yours,  the  critical  situation  in  which  you  and  the  whole  kingdom  are, 


72  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  intrigues,  the  factions?  Who  can  counsel  you  better  or  be  more 
worthy  of  your  confidence  than  my  minister,  who  knows  to  the  bottom  the 
State  and  all  the  forces  therein  at  work?  .  .  . 

"  The  king  is  old ;  the  indigestion  from  which  he  suffers  is  not  insignifi- 
cant ;  changes  for  good  or  evil  may  befall  the  Du  Barry,  the  ministers. 
I  repeat,  my  dear  daughter,  if  you  love  me,  follow  my  advice,  which  is, 
to  follow  without  hesitancy  and  with  confidence  all  that  Mercy  tells  you 
or  exacts  of  you.  If  he  desires  that  you  should  repeat  your  attentions 
to  the  lady  or  to  others,  do  it." 

If  we  seek  an  explanation  of  this  extreme  vivacity  of  language, 
we  must  turn  to  the  circumstances  for  it.  This  letter  was  dated 
Feb.  13,  1772.  This  was  the  moment  when  that  great  crime, 
the  first  partition  of  Poland,  was  being  negotiated  by  Prussia, 
Russia,  and  Austria.  Maria  Theresa,  whose  conscience  revolted 
against  this  odious  bargain,  and  who  felt  remorse  for  it  during 
the  remainder  of  her  life,  was  seeking  for  the  time  to  put  a  stop 
to  it  by  the  only  means  in  her  power ;  namely,  by  strengthening 
the  Franco-Austrian  alliance  which  had  been  somewhat  weak- 
ened by  the  fall  of  Choiseul ;  but  D'Aiguillon  refused  to  listen  to 
the  semi-mysterious  overtures  of  Mercy,  and  there  was  not  at  that 
important  moment  any  ambassador  from  France  at  Vienna. 
Finding  her  advances  repelled  and  herself  deserted  by  Versailles, 
the  empress,  in  order  not  to  be  alone  exposed  to  a  war  between 
Russia  and  Prussia,  finished  by  taking  part  in  the  proposed  com- 
bination, which,  as  she  said,  put  a  blot  upon  her  whole  reign ;  and 
her  son,  Joseph  II.,  who  had  not  her  scruples,  accommodated 
himself  very  easily  to  an  arrangement  which  added  two  provinces 
to  his  States. 

The  affair  once  under  way,  however,  it  was  important  that 
nothing  should  interfere  with  it;  could  she  rest  easy  with  regard 
to  France?  Choiseul,  indeed,  was  no  longer  there,  —  Choiseul, 
who  under  similar  circumstances  would  have  threatened  to  throw 
himself  upon  the  Low  Countries,  and  never  would  have  con- 
sented to  the  partition.  The  new  ambassador  to  Vienna,  whom 
some  ill-informed  historians  have  tried  to  represent  as  a  clever 
diplomat,  the  Prince  de  Rohan,  scarcely  interfered  with  Kaunitz, 
and  contented  himself  with  amusing  the  emperor  with  his  conun- 
drums. D'Aiguillon,  who  was  without  genius,  credit,  or  talent,  and 
who  had  not  been  clever  enough  to  understand  at  the  first  hint 
the  overtures  which  Mercy  had  made  him,  seemed  hardly  capable 
of  exciting  any  serious  disquietude.  What  would  happen,  how- 


MERCY   AND    THE    DAUPHINESS.  73 

ever,  if,  resentful  of  the  sorry  role  he  had  played  at  his  debut  as 
minister,  and  vexed  by  the  haughty  reception  accorded  him  by 
the  dauphiness,  he  should  unite  his  efforts  with  those  of  the 
favourite,  who  was  equally  annoyed,  to  thwart,  out  of  vengeance, 
the  projects  of  the  court  of  Vienna?  It  was  necessary  above  all 
to  avoid  any  such  danger;  and  the  best  means  was  for  Marie 
Antoinette  to  consent  to  treat  the  minister  and  the  favourite  with 
more  tact. 

"  We  know  for  certain,"  Maria  Theresa  wrote  to  Mercy,  "  that  England 
and  the  king  of  Prussia  are  trying  to  win  over  the  Du  Barry.  France  is 
coquetting  with  Prussia.  The  king  is  feeble ;  those  around  him  do  not 
give  him  a  chance  to  reflect,  nor  to  follow  his  own  inclination.  You  see, 
therefore,  how  important  it  is  for  the  preservation  of  the  alliance  that  we 
use  every  means  not  to  come  to  any  rupture  at  this  critical  moment.  There 
is  no  one  save  my  daughter  who  can  prevent  this  misfortune ;  she  must 
cultivate  the  favour  of  the  king  by  her  assiduity  and  tenderness,  and  must 
treat  the  favourite  well.  I  do  not  exact  any  familiarity,  still  less  any  inti- 
macy, but  consideration  for  her  grandfather  and  master,  for  the  sake  of  the 
good  which  may  come  of  it  to  us  and  the  two  courts ;  the  alliance  may 
depend  upon  it." 

On  receiving  these  urgent  instructions,  Mercy  redoubled  his 
attentions  to  the  dominant  party.  At  his  instigation,'  Marie 
Antoinette,  who  knew  nothing  of  the  complications  of  European 
diplomacy,  but  who  naturally  feared  above  all  else  a  rupture  of 
the  Franco-Austrian  alliance,  consented  to  address  an  insignifi- 
cant word  to  the  countess ;  but  having  once  made  this  concession, 
she  resumed  her  disdainful  attitude. 

Mercy  dwelt  in  vain  upon  the  harm  that  might  result  to  their 
affairs;  in  vain  he  pointed  out  that  it  was  neither  right  nor 
decent  for  the  royal  family  to  seem  by  its  bearing  to  criticise  the 
conduct  of  the  king;  "that  if  the  monarch  was  in  the  path  of 
error,  it  was  not  for  his  children  to  call  attention  to  the  fact ;  that 
the  Holy  Scriptures  gave  a  very  striking  lesson  on  this  subject  in 
the  malediction  of  the  Lord  on  the  sons  of  Noah  who  laughed 
at  the  drunkenness  of  their  father,  while  God  had  blessed  the 
children  of  the  patriarch  who  covered  him  with  their  cloak." 

The  dauphiness,  for  a  moment  moved,  not  by  the  theological 
reasoning  of  the  ambassador,  but  by  the  \vish  to  please  her 
mother,  even  by  sacrificing  her  very  legitimate  repugnances, 
soon  returned  to  her  original  opposition,  being  encouraged 
therein,  moreover,  by  her  husband,  who  held  Madame  du  Barry 
in  abhorrence. 


74  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

In  vain  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  contrived  new  schemes  with 
Madame  de  Narbonne  to  persuade  Marie  Antoinette  to  treat 
the  favourite  better;  in  vain  Madame  Adelaide,  who  had  become 
reconciled  to  the  countess  out  of  policy,  sought  to  reconcile 
her  niece  to  her.  The  influence  of  the  old  aunt  was  past,  and 
the  dauphin  replied  dryly  to  her  hints,  "  I  advise  you,  my  aunt, 
not  to  meddle  in  the  intrigues  of  Monsieur  d'Aiguillon,  for  he 
is  a  bad  fellow."  When  Madame  du  Barry  presented  to  the 
dauphiness  her  niece,  who  had  been  recently  married,  she  could 
not  obtain  a  word  either  for  her  or  for  herself.  Three  months 
later  she  met  with  no  better  reception  for  her  sister-in-law,  the 
Comtesse  d'Argicourt  Maria  Theresa  scolded  ;  but  Marie  An- 
toinette contented  herself  with  replying  that  if  she  had  acted 
otherwise  the  dauphin  would  have  disapproved.  And  she  added 
these  words,  which  left  her  mother  little  hope  of  effecting  a 
change,  "  When  one  has  adopted  a  course  of  behaviour,  one 
should  not  depart  from  it." 

The  favourite,  however,  no  longer  complained.  Mercy  had 
made  some  observations  to  her  one  day  on  the  present  and 
future,  and  the  advantage  of  managing  the  royal  family,  that  had 
produced  their  effect.  The  future  looked  dark  for  Madame  du 
Barry.  Her  dismissal  had  already  been  talked  of.  The  king  was 
growing  old ;  divers  symptoms  had  warned  him  that  infirmities 
had  come  with  years ;  he  might  recall  to  memory  the  faith  he  had 
known  in  his  youth.  The  sudden  death  of  some  of  his  intimates, 
struck  down  almost  before  his  eyes,  had  made  a  profound  im- 
pression on  his  frivolous  mind.  He  began  to  discourse  of  his 
age,  of  the  state  of  his  health,  of  the  awful  account  that  each  man 
must  some  day  render  unto  God  of  the  use  he  had  made  of  his 
life.  An  intrigue  skilfully  conducted,  and  for  which  they  had 
the  wit  to  gain  over  Madame  Louise,  to  oust  the  confessor  of  the 
king,  the  Abb6  Maudoux,  a  pious  and  enlightened  priest,  who 
was  at  the  same  time  Marie  Antoinette's  confessor,  had  failed, 
owing  to  the  firmness  of  the  young  princess.  Did  all  these  con- 
siderations determine  Madame  du  Barry  to  change  her  conduct 
toward  her  who  was  but  dauphiness  to-day,  but  who  might  be 
queen  to-morrow?  However  that  may  be,  from  the  beginning  of 
the  last  months  of  1773,  we  find  the  favourite  employing  unheard- 
of  efforts  to  win  over  Marie  Antoinette.  Madame  du  Barry  made 
incessant  overtures  to  her ;  she  offered  to  get  the  king  to  recall 
the  Comtesse  de  Gramont  if  the  dauphiness  would  express  a 


MARIE    ANTOINETTE   JUSTIFIED.  75 

desire  to  have  her  do  so.  She  even  went  so  far  as  to  propose 
to  persuade  the  old  monarch  to  buy  her  a  magnificent  pair  of 
diamond  ear-rings,  estimated  to  be  worth  seven  hundred  thousand 
livres.  Despite  her  love  for  gems,  the  dauphiness  replied  simply 
that  she  had  no  desire  to  increase  the  number  she  already  pos- 
sessed. Beaten  as  enemy,  repelled  as  ally,  Madame  du  Barry 
adopted  the  only  course  proper  for  her,  and  the  one  she  should 
never  have  departed  from:  she  remained  quiet  and  made  no 
more  complaints. 

This  was  the  end  and  the  proper  solution,  and  the  one,  more- 
over, which  it  might  have  been  easy  to  foretell,  of  that  long  and 
scandalous  wrangle  in  which,  in  contempt  of  all  order,  natural 
and  divine,  a  mistress,  dragged  from  the  mud,  had  held  at  bay 
during  four  years  a  princess  of  the  royal  blood,  and  wife  to  the 
heir  of  the  crown  of  France,  —  a  wrangle  which  had  given  occa- 
sion to  so  many  annoyances  at  court,  to  so  many  legitimate 
revolts  on  the  part  of  Marie  Antoinette,  to  so  many  wise  ma- 
noeuvres on  the  part  of  Mercy,  to  so  many  severe  and  unjust 
reprimands  from  Maria  Theresa.  For  those  who  reason  coldly, 
with  that  haughty  indifference  to  the  moral  aspect  of  a  ques- 
tion, and  regard  for  material  interest  alone,  which  is  one  of  the 
traditions  of  modern  diplomacy,  it  is  easy  to  understand  the 
disquietude  of  the  empress,  her  incessant  recommendations,  even 
her  exactions;  but  it  is  more  easy  to  comprehend  —  we  would 
willingly  say,  to  share  — the  virginal  repugnance  of  Marie  An- 
toinette. Perhaps  the  motives  of  the  empress  were  more  pru- 
dent; but  those  of  the  dauphiness  were  incontestably  finer. 
One  loves  to  feel  that  delicate  fibre  of  wounded  modesty  vibrate 
in  the  heart  of  the  young  woman,  and  one  contemplates  with 
emotion  that  "  chastity  of  honour,"  as  Burke  says,  which  feared 
to  soil  the  whiteness  of  its  wings  by  any  unworthy  contact. 
Marie  Antoinette  comes  out  of  the  conflict  nobler  and  purer. 
If  politics  condemn  her,  public  honour  absolves  her. 


CHAPTER   VII. 

POPULARITY  OF  THE  DAUPHINESS. — TRAITS  OF  KINDNESS. — THE  PEASANT 
OF  ACHERES. — THE  BURNING  OF  THE  HOTEL  DIEU. — ENTRANCE  OF 
THE  DAUPHIN  AND  DAUPHINESS  INTO  PARIS. — THE  UNIVERSAL  EN- 
THUSIASM.— LETTER  FROM  MARIE  ANTOINETTE  TO  HER  MOTHER. — 
REPRESENTATIONS  AT  THE  COMEDIE  FRANQAISE  AND  AT  THE  COMEDIE 
ITALIENNE.  —  THE  COMTE  DE  PROVENCE  AND  THE  COMTE  D'ARTOIS; 
THEIR  MARRIAGES  ;  THEIR  RELATIONS  WITH  THE  DAUPHINESS.  — 
THE  AMUSEMENTS  OF  THE  YOUNG  COUPLES.  —  COMEDY  IN  THEIR 
PRIVATE  APARTMENTS.  —  THE  INTIMACY  OF  THE  DAUPHIN  AND 
THE  DAUPHINESS.  —  THE  DAUPHIN  BECOMES  LESS  TIMID,  THE  DAU- 
PHINESS MORE  THOUGHTFUL.  —  THE  ASSURED  POSITION  OF  MARIE 
ANTOINETTE  AT  THE  COURT  IN  THE  BEGINNING  OF  MAY,  1774. 

ALL  these  disputes,  however,  did  not  in  any  way  lessen  the 
popularity  of  the  dauphiness.  Apart  from  some  courtiers 
whose  fortunes  were  influenced  by  them,  and  some  chroniclers 
whose  gazettes  were  supported  by  them,  the  public  concerned 
itself  but  little  with  these  petty  intrigues,  woven  within  the  narrow 
limits  of  the  royal  palaces.  It  had  been,  as  it  were,  bewildered 
by  the  fresh  and  gracious  apparition  which  had  traversed  France 
from  Strasburg  to  Versailles  like  a  brilliant  and  kindly  meteor ; 
it  continued  to  believe  in  her  brilliancy  and  her  goodness.  "  The 
natural  disposition  of  the  French  is  to  love  their  princes,"  the 
Mar6chal  de  Noailles  wrote  in  1753.  The  people  did  not  distress 
themselves  because  that  child  of  fifteen  smiled  at  the  antiquated 
mode  of  certain  old  dowagers,  or  broke  certain  rules  of  etiquette 
to  the  horror  of  Madame  de  Noailles.  The  people  loved  their 
dauphiness;  they  saw  only  the  fresh  bloom  of  her  cheek  and  her 
tenderness  of  heart.  Unfortunately  they  had  only  too  little 
opportunity  of  observing  them.  Certain  malicious  jealousies  had 
caused  the  postponement  of  the  solemn  entry  of  the  young  couple 
into  the  good  city  of  Paris.  But  in  the  distance,  where  Marie 
Antoinette  was  kept,  the  public  saw  her  ever  charming,  as  on  the 
day  of  her  arrival,  kind  and  sympathetic,  as  on  the  day  she  sent 


POPULARITY    OF    THE    DAUPHINESS.  77 

all  the  money  in  her  purse  to  those  wounded  on  the  Place  Louis 
XV.  "  Her  youth,"  said  Montbarrey,  "  her  face,  her  figure, 
seduced  all  hearts  and  called  forth  enthusiasm."  It  would  seem 
as  if  they  hailed  her  as  the  bride  of  a  whole  people ;  she  was 
indeed  —  as  a  pamphleteer  above  suspicion  wrote  —  "the  idol  of 
the  nation."  France,  who  knew  not  where  to  bestow  its  tradi- 
tional love  for  its  princes,  gave  it  with  both  hands  to  the  dauphin- 
ess.  She  was  the  bright  beacon  toward  which  all  eyes  turned, 
the  fertile  source  whence  sprang  all  the  graces.  It  was  incredible 
that  any  popular  measure  should  be  undertaken  without  originat- 
ing with  her  or  passing  through  her  hands. 

"  Madame  the  Dauphiness  is  making  herself  adored  here," 
wrote  the  impartial  Mercy  at  the  end  of  1770;  "  and  public  opin- 
ion is  so  fixed  on  this  point  that  some  days  ago  on  the  occasion 
of  a  diminution  of  the  price  of  bread  the  people  of  Paris  said 
openly  in  the  streets  and  markets  that  it  was  surely  Madame  the 
Dauphiness  who  had  solicited  and  obtained  this  reduction  for  the 
benefit  of  the  poor  people." 

These  charming  traits,  which  sprang  naturally  from  her  heart 
and  were  carried  by  the  thousand  voices  of  fame  abroad,  sus- 
tained and  augmented  the  popular  enthusiasm.  It  was  related 
that  when  the  Due  de  Duras,  gentleman  of  the  bedchamber, 
proposed  to  the  young  princess  to  give  some  balls  during  her 
sojourn  at  Fontainebleau,  she  replied  that  though  it  would  be 
very  agreeable  to  her  to  do  so,  the  expenditures  would  thereby 
be  increased,  and  she  would  not  have  it  said  that  money  could  be 
found  for  her  amusements  and  not  for  the  salaries  of  the  people 
in  her  service;  and  that  therefore  she  should  decline  to  con- 
sider his  suggestion.  They  knew  that  she  had  used  her  influence 
in  behalf  of  some  soldiers  who  had  been  too  severely  punished. 
It  was  told  that  one  day  during  a  chase,  the  animal  being  brought 
to  bay  took  to  the  river ;  the  hunters  pressed  forward  to  be  in 
at  the  death,  but  in  order  to  accomplish  this  it  was  necessary  to 
traverse  a  field  of  wheat.  The  dauphiness  ordered  them  to  make 
a  detour,  preferring,  she  said,  to  miss  the  spectacle  rather  than 
occasion  so  much  harm  to  the  farmers,  who  were  always  ill 
indemnified  for  such  losses. 

Another  time  during  the  chase,  while  passing  over  a  bridge  the 
postilion  of  her  carriage  fell,  and  four  of  the  horses  passed  over 
his  body;  they  picked  him  up,  bleeding  and  unconscious.  The 
dauphiness  immediately  stopped  and  desired  that  the  man's 


78  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

wounds  should  be  dressed  before  her.  "  My  friend,"  she  said  to 
a  page,  with  spontaneous  vivacity,  "  go  for  a  doctor."  "Run 
quickly  for  a  litter,"  she  said  to  another;  "  see  if  he  speaks,  if  he 
is  conscious."  And  she  would  not  leave  the  place  until  she  was 
assured  that  the  wounded  man  would  be  well  cared  for  and 
carried  gently  to  Versailles,  where  she  had  him  visited  by  her 
own  surgeon.  Both  the  court  and  the  public  were  enraptured, 
and  the  one  remark  at  Paris  and  at  Versailles  was  that  in  this  act 
Maria  Theresa  would  have  recognized  her  daughter,  and  Henry 
IV.  his  heir. 

The  young  princess  exhibited  the  most  charming  considera- 
tion and  exquisite  delicacy  for  her  attendants.  One  day  the 
horse  of  her  equerry  kicked  her  on  the  foot;  she  concealed  her 
pain  and  continued  her  walk,  although  her  foot  was  greatly 
swollen,  in  order  to  spare  the  man  the  chagrin  of  having  been 
the  involuntary  author  of  the  accident.  Another  day  a  lackey 
hurt  himself  in  trying  to  move  a  piece  of  furniture  too  heavy  for 
him ;  she  bathed  the  wound  herself  and  made  him  a  compress  of 
her  handkerchief.  Another  time  she  gave  up  her  rides,  although 
we  know  her  passion  for  them,  in  order  that  her  equerry  might 
remain  with  his  wife,  who  was  ill. 

And  it  was  not  only  to  the  persons  in  her  service  to  whom  she 
showed  sympathy  and  consideration,  but  also  to  the  poor  and  all 
who  were  unfortunate.  A  year  after  the  incidents  which  we  have 
just  related,  a  groom  of  the  Comtesse  de  Provence,  in  traversing 
the  city  of  Compiegne,  fell  from  his  horse  and  was  seriously  hurt. 
The  princess  passed  coldly  on,  without  further  concern  for  the 
accident;  but  the  dauphiness,  who  was  following  at  a  short  dis- 
tance, stopped  her  carriage,  gave  orders  that  the  wounded  man 
should  be  cared  for,  and  did  not  continue  her  way  until  she  saw 
that  her  orders  had  been  carried  out.  The  public  did  not  fail  to 
compare  the  conduct  of  the  two  sisters-in-law,  and  one  can 
imagine  that  the  comparison  was  not  to  the  advantage  of  the 
Comtesse  de  Provence. 

But  her  best-known  deed,  and  the  one  which  made  the  greatest 
sensation,  was  that  which  is  known  as  the  incident  of  Acheres. 
It  was  at  Fontainebleau,  during  the  hunt  again,  on  Oct.  16,  1773. 
The  deer,  being  at  bay,  took  refuge  in  a  small  enclosure  of  the 
village  of  Acheres.  Finding  no  issue  thence,  and  rendered  furi- 
ous by  his  despair,  he  turned  upon  a  peasant  who  was  cultivating 
the  enclosure,  and  gored  him  twice  with  his  antlers,  —  once  in  the 


BURNING   OF   THE    HOTEL   DIEU.  79 

thigh  and  once  in  the  body.  The  man  was  thrown  down,  severely 
wounded.  His  wife,  wild  with  grief,  flew  toward  the  hunters 
and  fell  in  a  faint.  The  king,  after  giving  orders  that  she  should 
be  looked  after,  withdrew.  The  dauphiness  descended  from  her 
carriage,  made  the  unfortunate  woman  inhale  her  salts,  and  after 
having  brought  her  out  of  her  faint,  showered  upon  her  money, 
consolation,  and  tears.  She  then  made  her  get  into  her  carriage 
and  commanded  that  she  should  be  taken  to  her  house;  nor  did 
she  rejoin  the  hunt  until  she  had  assured  herself  that  the  two 
invalids  would  receive  the  necessary  attention. 

The  entire  court,  moved  by  her  noble  example,  hastened  to  aid 
the  unfortunate  ones.  The  dauphin  emptied  his  purse  into  their 
hands ;  the  Comtesse  de  Provence  did  the  same.  On  the  follow- 
ing days  Marie  Antoinette  did  not  fail  to  send  to  inquire  after 
the  wounded  man,  whose  condition  had  at  first  seemed  criti- 
cal, but  who  recovered,  nevertheless,  thanks  to  the  care  which 
the  surgeons  of  the  court,  on  the  order  of  the  young  princess, 
bestowed  upon  him.  The  public,  on  learning  these  details,  and 
delighted  with  the  tears  of  sympathy  which  the  dauphiness  had 
shed,  was  inexhaustible  in  its  praises  of  her;  there  was  but  one 
cry  of  admiration  for  her.  At  Fontainebleau  the  people  crowded 
together  wherever  there  was  a  chance  of  seeing  her.  At  Marly, 
at  Versailles,  they  greeted  her  with  such  enthusiasm  and  accla- 
mation when  she  went  out  as  almost  to  frighten  her.  The  papers 
of  the  time  were  full  of  verses  in  her  honour,  and  one  witty 
woman,  the  Princesse  de  Beauvau,  originated  this  saying,  which 
was  too  much  in  the  taste  of  the  day  not  to  be  popular,  "  Ma- 
dame the  Dauphiness  follows  nature,  and  Monsieur  the  Dauphin 
follows  Madame  the  Dauphiness." 

We  might  multiply  indefinitely  these  instances,  which  abound 
in  the  memoirs  of  her  contemporaries  and  the  reports  of  Mercy. 
We  will  cite  but  one  more.  During  the  night  of  the  2Qth  and 
30th  of  December,  1772,  a  frightful  fire  broke  out  in  the  Hotel 
Dieu  at  Paris.  The  fire,  after  having  smouldered  in  the  cellars, 
burst  forth  toward  one  o'clock  in  the  morning  with  such  violence 
that  the  light  was  visible  as  far  as  the  outskirts  of  the  city.  De- 
spite the  promptitude  with  which  aid  arrived,  despite  the  activity 
of  the  fire  department,  which  had  been  recently  organized,  and 
the  devotion  of  workers  at  whose  head  were  the  archbishop  of 
Paris,  Monseigneur  de  Beaumont,  the  principal  magistrates,  and 
the  priests  of  the  city,  the  majority  of  the  buildings  were  destroyed ; 


80  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  loss  was  valued  at  two  millions.  Ten  of  the  sick  were  burned 
to  death ;  the  others  were  carried  in  haste  to  the  archbishop's 
palace,  to  Notre  Dame  and  to  the  churches;  and  several  of  those 
who  had  run  to  their  aid  perished  in  the  flames  or  were  wounded. 

Seized  with  consternation  at  this  frightful  disaster,  the  arch- 
bishop of  Paris  made  a  warm  appeal  to  public  charity  and  or- 
dered collections  to  be  taken.  When  Marie  Antoinette  was 
informed  of  it,  she  hastened  to  send  a  thousand  6cus,  and  with  a 
modesty  which  does  her  even  greater  honour  than  her  compas- 
sion, took  the  most  minute  precautions  that  no  one  should  know 
of  it,  pushing  the  mystery  so  far  as  to  say  nothing  of  it  to  Mercy 
or  to  Vermond. 

Despite  this,  the  secret  leaked  out ;  and  the  public  was  the  more 
grateful  to  the  young  princess  for  her  generous  charity  since  the 
initiative  had  come  from  her,  and  no  one  of  the  royal  family  had 
set  her  the  example.  But  such  compliments  were  embarrassing 
to  her  modesty,  and  she  sought  to  escape  them. 

When,  therefore,  on  June  8,  1773,  Marie  Antoinette,  preceded 
by  these  memories  and  bearing  on  her  forehead  the  aureole  of 
all  her  hopes,  finally  made  her  entrance  into  the  capital,  the  en- 
thusiasm of  the  Parisians  was  indescribable.  It  was  customary 
to  have  this  ceremony  of  the  entrance  of  the  dauphin  follow 
shortly  after  the  celebration  of  the  marriage ;  but  the  cabal,  which 
feared  the  popularity  of  the  young  princess  and  desired  not  to 
have  it  increased  by  the  glory  of  a  public  triumph,  had  suc- 
ceeded in  awakening  the  distrustful  susceptibility  of  the  old  mon- 
arch, who  for  a  long  time  had  become  unused  to  acclamations. 
Docile  to  the  suggestions  of  his  mistress  and  his  minister,  Louis 
XV.  had  always  put  off  the  official  ceremony,  and  Marie  Antoi- 
nette, despite  her  ardent  desire,  had  never  had  the  pleasure  of 
seeing  Paris  and  of  being  seen  there ;  she  had  not  even  been 
able,  as  she  one  day  planned,  to  drive  through  the  boulevards. 
Finally,  in  the  month  of  May,  1773,  she  decided  to  speak  to  the 
king  of  her  desire;  and  this  prince,  who  could  never  refuse  any- 
thing to  her  face,  replied  that  he  demanded  nothing  better,  and 
that  she  was  free  to  choose  the  day  that  would  suit  her.  The 
date  was  fixed  for  the  8th  of  June;  the  preparations  were  pushed 
with  vigour,  and  the  ceremony  was  magnificent.  Nothing  like  it 
had  been  seen  for  a  long  time.  The  people  of  Paris  were  eager 
to  see  their  young  princess,  whose  grace  and  virtues  were  cele- 
brated by  fame,  and  whom  they  did  not  yet  know.  At  the  Gate 


THE    ENTRANCE    INTO    PARIS.  8 1 

of  the  Conference  the  couple  were  received  by  the  Due  de  Brissac, 
governor  of  Paris,  the  lieutenant  of  police,  Monsieur  de  Sartines, 
the  corps  de  ville,  and  the  provost  of  the  merchants.  There, 
while  they  were  being  presented  with  the  keys  of  the  good  city 
on  a  silver  platter,  the  women  of  the  halles  offered  them  the  first 
products  of  the  market,  flowers  and  fruits.  The  august  couple 
with  their  suite  then  entered  state  coaches  and  traversed  the 
Quai  des  Tuileries,  the  Pont  Royal,  the  Quai  Conti,  where  the 
provost  of  the  mint  had  ranged  his  company  of  cavalry,  the  Pont 
Xeuf,  where  the  lieutenant  of  the  prison  awaited  them  at  the  foot 
of  the  statue  of  Henry  IV.,  with  the  guards  de  robe  courte,  passed 
along  the  Quai  des  Orfevres,  the  Rue  St.  Louis,  passing  before 
the  Hotel  Dieu,  where  the  mother  prioress  stood  with  her  nuns, 
and  arrived  at  Notre  Dame.  The  dauphin  and  dauphiness  were 
met  at  the  door  by  the  archbishop  and  the  chapter,  and  went  to 
kneel  in  the  choir,  and  thence  to  the  chapel  of  the  Holy  Virgin, 
where  the  chaplain  of  the  king  celebrated  low  mass  while  the 
choir  sang  a  motet.  After  mass  they  visited  the  treasury,  then 
went  to  Ste.  Genevieve,  making  the  tour  of  the  shrine  of  the 
saint,  and  finally  returned  to  the  Tuileries.  At  the  College  of 
Louis  le  Grand,  the  rector  of  the  university,  at  the  head  of  the 
four  faculties,  addressed  them;  at  the  College  Montaigu  the 
students  recited  verses  to  them. 

These  were  the  official  ceremonies,  but  what  was  not  on  the 
programme  was  the  truly  extraordinary  enthusiasm  of  the  public ; 
along  the  entire  route  of  their  progress  the  crowd  was  so  com- 
pact that  it  was  almost  impossible  for  the  carriage  to  advance. 
Everywhere  were  decorations,  triumphal  arches,  pavements 
strewn  with  flowers,  everywhere  frantic  vivats.  The  dauphin- 
ess  had  a  smile  for  each,  a  bow  for  persons  of  distinction,  a 
beaming  countenance  for  all.  "  It  is  impossible,"  Mercy 
wrote,  ''to  show  more  grace,  more  charm,  and  more  presence 
of  mind  than  Madame  the  Archduchess  has  displayed  at  this 
juncture."  Her  smile  went  to  the  heart.  Hands  were  clapped, 
handkerchiefs  waved,  hats  thrown  into  the  air;  there  was  uni- 
versal delight.  With  her  habitual  kindness,  the  young  princess 
ordered  her  guards  to  allow  everyone  to  approach;  it  seemed 
as  if  for  that  day  the  ancient  etiquette  had  been  abolished.  At 
the  Tuileries  the  women  of  the  halles  dined  in  the  concert-hall ; 
palace  and  garden  were  both  full  of  people.  When  the  dauphin- 
ess  appeared  on  the  balcony  she  could  not  help  exclaiming, 
VOL.  i.  —  6 


82  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

frightened  by  the  sea  of  humanity,  "  Heavens,  what  a  crowd  !  " 
"  Madame,"  replied  the  Due  de  Brissac,  gallantly,  "  without  wish- 
ing to  displease  Monsieur  the  Dauphin,  here  are  two  hundred 
thousand  people  who  are  in  love  with  you." 

But  the  dauphin  was  not  jealous ;  he  was  happy.  The  enthu- 
siasm of  the  crowd,  the  charm  of  his  companion,  reacted  upon 
him,  and  conquering  his  natural  timidity,  he  responded  with  ease 
to  the  speeches  which  were  addressed  to  him.  His  habitual 
coldness  was,  as  it  \vere,  warmed  by  the  reflection  of  the  grace 
of  his  young  wife;  and  the  populace,  remarking  with  pleasure  the 
unexpected  transformation,  ascribed  the  honour  of  it  to  the  dau- 
phiness.  "  How  beautiful  she  is  !  How  charming  she  is !  "  were 
heard  on  every  side. 

After  the  dinner  in  public  the  couple,  arm  in  arm,  descended 
into  the  garden  of  the'Tuileries,  where  they  walked.  Fifty  thou- 
sand persons  were  gathered  in  the  allees,  on  the  benches,  on  the 
balustrades,  even  in  the  trees.  The  masses  were  so  compact  that 
the  royal  couple  remained  for  nearly  three  quarters  of  an  hour 
unable  to  advance  or  to  retreat ;  for  a  moment  even  they  were 
separated  from  their  suite.  But  this  eagerness  delighted  them 
both ;  they  felt  themselves  in  safety  in  the  midst  of  their  people, 
enjoyed  their  delight,  listened  with  emotion  to  the  acclamations, 
nai'vely  enthusiastic,  which  escaped  from  all  hearts ;  and  the  only 
order  which  the  dauphiness  gave  to  her  guards  was  not  to  turn 
away  any  one,  and  to  allow  every  one  .who  wished  to  approach. 

When,  after  this  delightful  walk  and  before  their  departure, 
the  two  princes  ascended  to  the  chateau  to  contemplate  for  the 
last  time  the  spectacle,  and  remained  during  half  an  hour  on  the 
terrace,  despite  the  rays  of  a  hot  sun,  saluting  with  their  hands  to 
the  right  and  left  the  crowd  that  pressed  about  the  base  of  the 
Tuileries,  there  rose  from  the  assemblage  but  one  universal  cry 
of  joy  and  delight.  Some  one  had  said  that  France  had  felt  for 
Louis  XV.  the  affection  of  both  mother  and  mistress ;  it  seemed 
on  that  8th  of  June,  1773,  as  though  the  capital  had  bestowed 
some  of  that  tenderness  upon  Marie  Antoinette. 

As  for  the  dauphiness,  she  could  hardly  restrain  the  tears  of 
happiness  which  filled  her  eyes.  "  Ah,  these  good  people  !  "  she 
repeated  again  and  again. 

"  I  had  on  Tuesday  last,"  she  wrote  a  few  days  later  to  her  mother, 
"  an  experience  which  I  shall  never  forget.  We  made  our  entrance  into 
Paris.  As  for  honours,  we  received  more  than  you  can  imagine  ;  but  this, 


THE    COMEDIE    FRAN^AISE.  83 

though  delightful,  was  not  what  touched  me  most :  't  was  the  tenderness 
and  eagerness  of  those  poor  people,  who,  despite  the  taxes  with  which 
they  are  burdened,  were  transported  with  joy  to  see  us.  When  we  went 
to  walk  in  the  Tuileries,  there  was  such  a  crowd  that  for  three  quarters  of 
an  hour  we  could  neither  advance  nor  retreat.  Monsieur  the  Dauphin 
and  I  ordered  the  guards  several  times  not  to  strike  any  one,  which  pro- 
duced a  very  good  effect.  There  was  such  good  order  during  the  day 
that,  despite  the  enormous  mob  which  followed  us  everywhere,  no  one 
was  hurt.  On  our  return  from  our  walk  we  ascended  to  the  open  terrace 
and  remained  there  for  half  an  hour.  I  cannot  tell  you,  my  dear  mamma, 
what  transports  of  joy,  of  affection,  were  manifested  toward  us  during  that 
time.  Before  withdrawing  we  waved  our  hands  to  the  people,  which  gave 
great  pleasure.  How  happy  ought  one  in  our  position  to  be,  to  be  able 
to  gain  the  friendship  of  a  whole  people  so  cheaply  !  Yet  there  is  nothing 
more  precious  ;  I  have  felt  it,  and  I  shall  never  forget  it." 

Louis  XV.  awaited  at  Versailles  with  some  impatience  the  re- 
turn of  his  grandchildren.  "  My  children,"  he  said  to  them  when 
they  returned,  "  I  was  almost  uneasy.  You  must  be  very  fatigued 
with  your  day."  "  It  has  been  the  sweetest  of  my  life,"  replied 
the  dauphiness ;  and  associating  with  a  delicate  flattery  the  name 
of  the  king  and  those  of  his  children  who  had  just  been  the  object 
of  this  popular  demonstration,  "  You  must  be  exceedingly  beloved 
by  the  Parisians,"  she  said  to  the  old  monarch,  "  for  they  have 
treated  us  very  well." 

Delighted  with  this  enthusiastic  reception,  the  young  princess 
had  but  one  desire :  to  return  often  to  that  city  which  had 
greeted  her  with  such  acclamation.  She  obtained  permission 
from  the  king  to  return  thither  every  week  to  the  play ;  at  first 
with  all  the  equipage  of  royalty,  to  the  sound  of  cannon  from 
the  Bastille  and  Invalides,  with  a  great  display  of  French  and 
Swiss  guards  round  the  theatre  and  even  on  the  stage;  soon, 
however,  with  the  greatest  simplicity,  in  a  simple  dress  and  with 
a  small  suite.  Whether  her  visits  were  ceremonious  or  private, 
the  success  of  them  was  the  same.  "  A  volume  might  be  writ- 
ten," Mercy  said,  "  of  all  the  affectionate  sayings  and  remarks 
concerning  the  figure,  the  grace,  the  air  of  affability  and  kindness 
of  Madame  the  Archduchess."  One  day,  —  it  was  on  June  23, —  at 
the  Comedie  Franchise,  the  "  Siege  of  Calais  "  was  given.  In  the 
third  act,  where  Mademoiselle  Vestris  spoke  the  two  lines, 

"  The  French  in  their  prince  love  to  find  a  brother, 
Who,  born  son  of  the  State,  becomes  its  father," 


84  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

she  turned  toward  the  dauphin;  the  entire  audience  applauded 
with  transport. 

A  little  farther  on,  when  this  passage  was  recited, 

"  What  a  lesson  for  you,  superb  potentate  ! 
Oh,  keep  watch  o'er  your  subjects  of  lowest  estate, 
Lest  far  from  your  gaze  one  from  misery  dies 
Who  one  day  your  empire  had  saved," 

it  was  the  dauphin  and  dauphiness  who  applauded  in  their  turn, 
and  this  exhibition  of  feeling  was  received  with  new  transpbrts  of 
tenderness  and  gratitude. 

Another  day,  at  the  Comedie  Italienne,  the  "  Deserter  "  was 
given.  The  refrain  of  a  couplet  was  "  Long  live  the  king."  The 
dauphiness  applauded.  The  refrain  was  repeated.  The  actor 
Clairval  added,  "  And  his  dear  children."  The  entire  parterre 
joined  with  the  actors  in  clapping  their  hands,  and  the  entertain- 
ment ended  with  the  singing  of  five  couplets  improvised  in 
honour  of  the  young  couple. 

At  each  visit  —  to  the  Ste.  Ovide  fair,  to  the  salon,  where 
the  dauphin  stopped  before  the  picture  by  Marchy  which  repre- 
sented him  walking  in  the  garden  of  the  Tuileries  with  his  wife 
on  his  arm,  in  the  garden  of  Marechal  de  Biron  — there  was  the 
same  enthusiasm,  the  same  acclamations ;  and  when  the  court 
departed  for  Compiegne,  it  was  not  without  regret  that  Marie 
Antoinette  left  the  good  city  of  Paris. 

Despite  the  pains  which  were  taken  to  arouse  his  jealousy, 
Louis  XV.  enjoyed  this  brilliant  triumph  of  his  grandchildren. 
Mesdames,  it  is  true,  took  umbrage  at  it;  and  the  cabal  redoubled 
its  hate  and  rage,  but  it  spent  itself  in  vain  efforts.  The  entrance 
of  the  Comte  and  Comtesse  de  Provence,  to  which  they  tried  to 
give  royal  magnificence  to  counterbalance  the  impression  pro- 
duced by  that  of  the  dauphin,  but  ended  in  miserable  failure. 
The  pomp  and  circumstance  left  the  public  indifferent.  The 
Comte  and  Comtesse  de  Provence  were  completely  eclipsed  by 
the  dauphiness;  it  was  of  her  alone  the  public  talked;  it  was  she 
alone  whom  they  wished  to  see. 

We  may  think  that,  surrounded  by  this  bright  armour  of 
popular  sympathy,  the  dauphiness  had  no  need  to  fear  the  in- 
trigues of  the  palace  and  the  rivalries  of  the  court.  The  Comte 
de  Provence,  who  was  forty  years  later  to  inaugurate  the  consti- 
tutional regime  in  France,  and  to  bind  with  so  wise  a  hand  the 


THE    COMTE   DE   PROVENCE.  85 

wounds  given  to  the  country  by  the  Revolution  and  the  Empire, 
had  not  then  shown  the  qualities  which  he  displayed  upon  the 
throne.  A  year  younger  than  the  dauphin,  he  had  from  his 
infancy  possessed  a  precocious  ambition,  a  serious  disposition, 
but  one  that  was  also  distrustful  and  inclined  to  intrigue;  of  a 
subtle  and  cultivated  mind,  possessing  a  taste  both  for  letters  and 
politics,  highly  valued  by  those  around  him,  and  usually  to  the 
disparagement  of  his  older  brother,  he  scarcely  dissimulated  his 
resentment  at  being  in  the  second  rank  when  he  believed  himself 
fitted  by  nature  for  the  first.  With  such  aspirations  and  senti- 
ments he  would  seem  to  be  an  instrument  ready  made  to  the 
hands  of  the  cabal  hostile  to  Marie  Antoinette.  They  tried  to 
make  him  pose  as  a  rival  to  his  brother,  particularly  when  his 
marriage  to  a  princess  of  Savoy  had  assured  his  position  at 
court;  they  affected  on  that  occasion  to  establish  his  household 
on  a  scale  equal  to  that  of  the  dauphin.  His  wife,  who  was 
without  intelligence  or  grace  and  Italian  in  character,  lent  her- 
self readily  to  these  petty  and  malicious  attempts.  On  several 
occasions  Marie  Antoinette  had  to  complain  of  the  attitude  of  the 
young  couple  toward  her.  Then  came  a  complete  change  of  base. 
\Yas  it  a  recognition  of  their  impotence  in  face  of  the  growing 
popularity  of  the  dauphiness?  Was  it  regret  that  he  had  been 
led  by  the  Due  de  la  Vauguyon?  Or  was  it  simply  a  change  of 
front  in  a  plan  perseveringly  ambitious  ?  However  that  may  be, 
after  the  death  of  his  governor,  the  young  prince  sought  a  recon- 
ciliation with  his  sister-in-law,  avowed  to  her  that  he  had  been 
wrong,  and  laid  the  whole  blame  upon  Monsieur  de  la  Vauguyon. 
Marie  Antoinette,  who  was  sweet-tempered  and  harboured  no 
rancour,  was  only  too  willing  to  forget  annoyances ;  their  rela- 
tions were  promptly  established  upon  a  footing  of  intimacy. 
Each  morning  the  Comte  de  Provence  came  to  the  apartment 
of  the  dauphiness  to  bring  her  the  news  of  the  court,  the  songs 
and  bons-mots  of  the  day;  he  contrived  with  her  schemes  for 
their  amusement,  laid  before  her  his  plans  of  conduct,  and  pro- 
posed that  they  should  form  a  party  at  the  court.  Always  con- 
fiding and  without  calculation,  Marie  Antoinette  gave  herself  up 
to  the  charm  of  an  intimacy  which,  thanks  to  the  wise  counsels 
of  Mercy,  was  productive  of  pleasure  but  of  no  inconvenience ; 
the  need  of  society,  the  desire  to  escape  from  the  despotism  of 
Mesdames,  the  attraction  of  his  witty  conversation,  disposed  her 
toward  this  friendship.  But  discovering  one  day  an  understand- 


86  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

ing  between  her  brother-in-law  and  the  Due  d'Aiguillon,  she  felt 
that  the  young  prince  was  not  perfectly  candid  in  his  behaviour. 
From  that  time  she  was  on  her  guard ;  the  visits  of  the  Comte 
de  Provence  became  less  frequent;  and  their  relations,  while 
remaining  friendly,  ceased  to  be  confidential. 

The  second  brother  of  the  dauphin,  the  Comte  d'Artois,  was 
by  no  means  so  ambitious.  With  a  charming  face,  a  good  fig- 
ure, lively  and  easy  manners,  skilful  in  all  bodily  exercises,  brave 
and  gallant  as  a  Bourbon,  the  only  prince  of  the  royal  family 
with  any  pretensions  to  elegance  in  the  eyes  of  his  contempo- 
raries, he  occupied  himself  less  with  business  than  with  pleasure ; 
he  did  not  desire  to  rule,  but  to  amuse  and  be  amused.  His 
character  was  the  exact  opposite  of  that  of  the  Comte  de  Pro- 
vence. Where  the  one  was  cold  and  designing,  leaving  nothing 
to  chance,  the  other  was  gay  and  open,  amiable  and  enthusiastic, 
but  vain  and  frivolous,  heedless  in  his  remarks,  inconsequent  in 
his  behaviour.  He  plagued  the  ministers,  defied  opinion,  listened 
to  no  one,  and  often  drew  upon  himself  the  displeasure  and  re- 
monstrances of  his  older  brother.  The  dauphiness  affected  not 
to  take  him  seriously,  and  to  turn  into  jest  whatever  he  did  or 
said  that  was  unreasonable.  This  conduct,  while  it  mortified  the 
young  prince,  impressed  him ;  but  it  is  easy  to  see  that  this 
impression  would  not  last  long,  and  that  the  day  would  come 
when  the  society  of  that  brother-in-law,  who  was  witty  and  agree- 
able, but  hot-headed,  turbulent,  and  "  bold  to  excess,"  might 
become  a  peril. 

As  for  the  Comtesse  d'Artois,  ill-favoured  by  nature,  small, 
with  a  poor  figure,  a  very  long  nose,  badly  set  eyes,  a  large 
mouth,  and  irregular  features,  not  less  ill-favoured  in  the  matter 
of  wit  and  talent,  insignificant,  and  little  loved  by  her  husband, 
she  could  not  possibly  rival  Marie  Antoinette,  although  the  cabal 
for  a  moment  aided  by  the  minister  of  Sardinia,  the  Comte  de  la 
Marmora,  tried  to  oppose  the  two  Piedmont  sisters  to  the  Austrian 
archduchess. 

But  Marie  Antoinette  was  not  jealous.  Strong  in  her  superi- 
ority, and  guided  by  the  inspiration  of  her  heart,  she  was  not 
disturbed  by  these  machinations,  which  could  not  touch  her,  and 
was  only  concerned  to  establish  harmony  in  the  royal  family. 
She  was  successful  in  this  delicate  enterprise.  Without  forming 
any  party,  as  the  Comte  de  Provence  had  suggested,  which  would 
not  have  been  without  danger,  the  young  couples  formed  a  circle. 


INTIMACY   OF   DAUPHIN    AND    DAUPHINESS.  87 

They  organized  diversions  together;  they  gave  balls,  parties, 
family  suppers;  they  went  together  to  the  balls  at  the  opera. 
They  did  more :  they  played  comedy.  In  one  of  the  rooms  of 
the  entresol  at  Versailles  where  no  one  ever  went,  they  arranged 
a  stage  from  which  the  divers  characters  might  appear  and  dis- 
appear into  an  armoire.  They  resolved  to  learn  to  play  the  best 
pieces  in  the  French  repertoire..  The  three  princesses,  the  Comte 
de  Provence,  and  the  Comte  d'Artois  were  the  actors ;  Monsieur 
Campan  was  the  manager  of  this  little  impromptu  troupe ;  the  dau- 
phin was  the  audience.  The  Comte  de  Provence  knew  his  roles 
without  mistake  ;  the  Comte  d'Artois  repeated  his  with  grace,  the 
dauphiness  with  intelligence ;  the  other  princesses  played  badly. 
From  time  to  time  one  heard  the  loud  laugh  of  the  dauphin  greet- 
ing the  entrance  of  the  actors  on  the  stage.  This  lasted  for  some 
time.  They  amused  themselves  greatly;  the  very  mystery  which 
surrounded  the  royal  troupe  gave  a  more  piquant  flavour  to  the 
forbidden  fruit.  Unfortunately,  one  day  Monsieur  Campan, 
already  in  costume,  went  in  search  of  something  he  had  left  in 
his  dressing-room,  and  ran  across  a  valet  of  the  wardrobe.  The 
secret  was  discovered ;  they  were  afraid  it  might  be  betrayed. 
What  would  the  king,  what  would  Mesdames  have  said  to  these 
amusements  which  were  worthy  of  school-children  on  a  holiday? 
They  feared  their  reproaches,  and  gave  up  a  diversion  which  had 
made  a  little  variety  in  the  monotony  of  the  court,  and  for  which 
the  dauphin  himself  had  acquired  a  veritable  liking. 

The  intimacy,  however,  of  the  young  married  couple  increased 
day  by  day.  The  dauphin  was  falling  under  the  charm  of  his 
young  wife ;  and  she  on  her  side  was  beginning  to  appreciate  his 
solid  qualities,  his  loyalty,  and  the  genuine  tenderness  which  lay 
beneath  his  rough  exterior.  Despite  the  wit  of  the  Comte  de 
Provence  and  the  elegance  of  the  Comte  d'Artois,  she  did  not 
hesitate  to  acknowledge  that  for  the  stability  of  their  relation, 
her  husband  was  greatly  their  superior.  One  day,  irritated  by 
the  indirect  methods  of  the  Comte  de  Provence,  and  hurt  by  the 
frivolities  of  the  Comte  d'Artois,  she  threw  herself  into  the  arms 
of  the  dauphin,  exclaiming,  "  I  feel,  my  dear  husband,  that  I  love 
you  more  and  more  every  day.  Your  upright  character  and 
frankness  charm  me ;  the  more  I  compare  you  with  others,  the 
more  I  appreciate  your  worth." 

There  were  undoubtedly  many  things  in  the  young  prince 
which  left  much  to  be  desired,  even  traits  which  sometimes 


88  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

shocked  the  feminine  delicacy,  the  innate  distinction  of  Marie 
Antoinette.  It  would  have  been  difficult,  perhaps,  to  meet  two 
characters  offering  greater  contrast  than  those  of  the  two  young 
people.  It  was  vivacity  united  to  coldness,  expansiveness  to 
taciturnity,  the  incarnation  of  grace  to  a  sort  of  native  inelegance ; 
in  a  word,  if  I  may  express  myself  thus,  it  was  a  polished  diamond 
by  the  side  of  a  rough  diamond.  The  dauphin  had  certain  tastes 
which  ill  accorded  with  the  great  elegance  of  his  wife ;  being 
passionately  devoted  to  the  chase,  violent  exercise,  manual 
labour,  he  pursued  them  with  an  immoderate  ardour  which  un- 
dermined his  health,  and  made  him  contract  an  air  of  negligence 
and  roughness  which  is  always  displeasing  in  a  future  sovereign, 
and  was  especially  displeasing  at  the  court  of  Versailles,  which 
at  that  time  set  the  fashion  for  all  Europe.  The  dauphiness  real- 
ized this ;  she  reproached  her  husband  for  his  slovenliness  with 
perhaps  too  great  warmth;  the  dauphin  was  at  first  provoked, 
and  then  began  to  cry.  His  young  wife  was  touched  ;  she  mingled 
her  tears  with  those  of  her  husband,  and  the  reconciliation  was 
very  tender.  The  Comtesse  de  Provence,  who  witnessed  this 
scene,  demanded  in  jest  if  the  peace  were  made,  and  the  dauphin 
replied  gallantly  that  "  quarrels  between  lovers  were  never  of 
long  duration."  Under  the  influence  of  this  gracious  Egeria  an 
improvement  manifested  itself  in  the  manners  of  the  young 
prince.  This  "  matter  in  the  rough,"  as  Joseph  II.  called  him, 
began  to  yield  up  its  treasures.  The  dauphin  tried  to  conquer 
his  timidity.  He  talked  more,  was  easier  in  public,  took  greater 
interest  in  dancing  and  in  the  amusements  of  society,  besides 
giving  more  time  to  serious  occupations,  and  in  particular  to  read- 
ing; for  this  young  woman  who  had  been  so  often  reproached 
for  not  devoting  herself  sufficiently  to  intellectual  occupations, 
was  the  first  to  encourage  her  husband  to  study.  She  rejoiced 
in  his  progress  silently,  taking  no  credit  to  herself  for  it,  and  was 
only  eager  to  show  it  off;  but  the  public  ascribed  the  honour  of 
it  to  her,  and  the  young  prince  snowed  his  gratitude  on  every 
occasion.  "  I  must  acknowledge,"  he  said  to  her  one  day,  "  that 
you  always  advise  me  well."  "  Do  you  love  me?  "  he  asked  her 
another  time.  "Yes,"  replied  the  princess,  with  spontaneous 
frankness,  "and  you  cannot  doubt  it;  I  love  you  sincerely,  and 
I  esteem  you  even  more."  The  dauphin  was  touched  by  this 
naYve  avowal ;  he  became  tender  and  almost  gallant  toward  his 
wife.  His  confidence  in  her  increased  day  by  day,  and  he  showed 


THE   DAUPHINESS    MORE   THOUGHTFUL.  89 

her  on  every  occasion  a  condescension  without  limit.  "  His  def- 
erence to  Madame  the  Archduchess,"  Mercy  wrote,  scarcely 
three  weeks  before  the  death  of  Louis  XV.,  "  proves  how  much 
importance  he  attaches  to  her  advice,  and  one  sees  that  his  grati- 
tude binds  him  more  and  more  to  his  august  wife." 

At  this  date  Marie  Antoinette's  position  was  so  secure  that 
nothing  seemed  able  to  shake  it.  For  a  year,  and  particularly 
since  her  triumphant  entrance  into  Paris,  her  power  had  con- 
stantly increased.  The  cabal,  which  had  tried  to  undermine  it, 
had  been  obliged  to  acknowledge  itself  defeated.  Mesdames,  after 
the  first  moment  of  anger,  had  resigned  themselves,  in  appear- 
ance at  least,  to  see  in  the  dauphiness  the  future  mistress  of  the 
State.  The  Comte  and  Comtesse  de  Provence  studied  but  to 
please  her;  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  silenced  his  rancour  and  sought 
occasions  to  be  agreeable  to  her  ;  the  comptroller-general  took 
her  orders ;  the  favourite  herself  made  overtures  ;  and  all  those  at 
court  who  took  thought  for  their  future  saw  that  their  only  course 
was  to  seek  security  in  the  friendship  and  good-will  of  the  dau- 
phiness. She  disarmed  all  jealousies  and  defeated  all  intrigues. 

As  for  her  success  with  the  public,  it  was  too  brilliant,  and  we 
have  described  it  at  too  great  length  above  to  refer  to  it  here. 

But  what  it  is  important  to  note,  because  it  has  been  contested, 
is  that  Marie  Antoinette  owed  this  success  to  herself  and  to  the 
development  of  her  good  qualities.  Whatever  one  may  say,  and 
despite  the  relapses  inevitable  at  her  age,  she  had  during  those 
four  years  made  sincere  efforts  to  correct  the  faults  which  her 
mother  and  the  Comte  de  Mercy  had  signalized  to  her  with  such 
persevering  vigilance. 

"  I  shall  not  fall  into  more  errors  than  I  can  help,"  she  said  one 
day;  "when  it  does  happen,  however,  that  I  am  guilty  of  any,  I 
shall  acknowledge  them."  She  kept  her  word,  and  in  many  ways 
succeeded  in  doing  better.  The  lively,  heedless,  somewhat  wilful 
child  who  had  crossed  the  Rhine  on  the  7th  of  May,  1770,  had 
grown  to  be  a  self-possessed  young  woman,  somewhat  ardent 
perhaps  at  times,  and  always  frank  and  naive,  but  no  longer  fol- 
lowing her  first  impulse,  calculating  better  the  import  of  her 
words  and  actions,  and  adding  to  the  attraction  of  her  naturalness 
and  openness  of  heart  the  more  durable  charm  of  a  consistent 
behaviour  and  thoughtful  attitude.  It  was  with  legitimate  pride 
that  she  could  say  to  her  faithful  counsellor  one  day,  "Acknowl- 
edge that  I  have  reformed  in  many  ways,"  which  he  could  not 
deny. 


90  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

She  tried  sincerely  to  interest  and  apply  her  mind,  formerly 
careless  and  inattentive,  to  serious  subjects.  Her  intelligence, 
which  was  marvellously  quick  to  understand  affairs,  but  which 
hated  them  extremely,  began  to  lend  itself  somewhat  more  to 
the  complications  of  politics,  while  her  piety  remained  intact  and 
pure  under  the  enlightened  direction  of  a  virtuous  and  modest 
priest,  the  Abbe  Maudoux.  Possessed  of  judgment  which  was 
always  clear  when  free  from  foreign  influences,  perspicacity  which 
often  put  Mercy  to  rout,  wonderful  sagacity  in  judging  men  and 
things,  her  eminent  qualities  seemed  to  assure  a  brilliant  future 
and  irresistible  empire  to  the  dauphiness,  if  she  could  but  conquer 
the  remnant  of  her  timidity,  her  too  great  love  of  pleasure,  and, 
above  all,  resist  the  importunities  and  insinuations  of  those  around 
her.  And  this  promise  of  power  lent  a  new  charm  to  the  arts  in 
which  she  excelled,  —  that  of  receiving  at  court,  of  presiding  over 
the  circle,  of  saying  an  amiable  word  to  every  one ;  to  her  innate 
kindliness,  now  enhanced  by  a  serene  dignity  and  self-composure, 
the  result  of  her  maturer  age. 

All  those  who  had  known  her  from  her  infancy  and  who  saw 
her  at  the  end  of  1773  or  at  the  beginning  of  the  year  1774, 
which  was  to  be  so  decisive  for  her,  —  the  Baron  de  Neny,  Field- 
Marshal  Lascy,  —  were  struck  by  this  happy  transformation. 
Mercy  wrote,  "  With  regard  to  the  instincts  of  her  character  and 
judgment  Madame  the  Dauphiness  is  so  fortunately  gifted  that  it 
is  morally  impossible  she  should  ever  fall  into  an  error  of  any 
consequence,  either  in  the  present  or  future." 

And  Maria  Theresa  herself,  who  was  so  severe  to  her  daughter, 
severe  sometimes  even  to  injustice,  could  not  help  replying  to 
her  faithful  ambassador,  on  April  5,  1774,  "  I  am  reassured  by 
the  news  which  you  send  me  of  the  behaviour  of  my  daughter." 

And  it  is  thus  that  Marie  Antoinette,  surrounded  by  intrigues 
and  cabals,  but  with  no  longer  any  cause  to  fear  them,  beloved 
by  the  public,  envied  but  respected  at  court,  dominating  all  by 
the  superiority  of  her  rank,  eclipsing  all  by  the  brilliancy  of  her 
personal  qualities,  —  that  Marie  Antoinette,  smiling  and  gay,  ad- 
vanced confidently  and  with  a  firm  step  toward  the  hour  when 
the  dauphiness  was  to  become  the  queen  of  France. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

DEATH  OF  Louis  XV. 

ON  Wednesday,  the  22d  of  April,  1774,  at  Trianon,  Louis  XV. 
was  seized  with  a  sudden  chill,  which  was  followed  by  a 
fever  and  violent  headache ;  on  the  28th  he  decided  to  return  to 
Versailles  ;  on  the  29th  he  was  bled  twice ;  during  the  night  of  the 
2Qth  and  3Oth  all  the 'worst  symptoms  of  small-pox  declared 
themselves.  The  disease  was  of  so  dangerous  a  nature  that  the 
very  air  of  the  palace  seemed  to  be  infected ;  fifty  persons  caught 
it  from  simply  traversing  the  galleries  at  Versailles ;  ten  died  of 
it;  and  the  Marquis  de  Letoriere,  who  had  opened  the  door  of  the 
royal  bedchamber  only  for  two  minutes,  was  struck  down  and 
died  in  a  few  hours. 

From  the  beginning  of  his  illness  Mesdames,  with  admirable 
devotion  and  despite  the  strongest  expostulations,  did  not  hesi- 
tate to  brave  contagion,  and  shut  themselves  up  with  their  father, 
remaining  day  and  night  by  his  bedside  and  beneath  the  very 
curtains.  Marie  Antoinette  wished  to  do  the  same ;  the  old. 
monarch  would  not  permit  it,  and  forbade  all  communication 
between  himself  and  the  young  royal  couple,  who  retired  into  the 
most  complete  isolation,  the  dauphin  refusing  to  give  any  order 
and  even  to  speak  to  the  ministers  so  long  as  his  grandfather 
lived. 

Startling  intrigues  were  carried  on  round  the  bed  of  the  sick 
man.  The  parties  Barrien  and  Anti-Barrien,  Aiguilloniste  and 
Anti-Aiguilloniste,  engaged  in  a  furious  battle,  whose  prize  was 
the  soul  of  this  poor  prince.  Unheard-of  efforts  were  made  to 
hinder  any  priest  from  reaching  him  who  might  speak  to  him  of 
eternity  and  thus  persuade  him  to  put  an  end  to  the  scandals  of 
his  life.  Madame  du  Barry  braved  the  contagion  in  order  to 
retain  her  influence,  and  came  each  day  to  sit  with  the  invalid ; 
but  it  was  noticed  that  the  king  spoke  to  his  mistress  with  indif- 


92  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

ference.  Their  watchfulness  redoubled.  The  Due  d'Aiguillon, 
the  Due  de  Richelieu,  the  Due  d'Aumont,  and  Laborde,  the 
groom  of  the  chamber,  forbade  with  jealous  rigour  the  entrance 
of  all  suspicious  persons.  On  the  2d  of  May  the  archbishop  of 
Paris  came  to  Versailles ;  he  had  great  difficulty  in  seeing  the 
dying  man,  at  whose  door  the  Due  de  Richelieu  tried  to  detain 
him.  The  interview  did  not  last  more  than  a  quarter  of  an  hour, 
and  produced  no  result.  The  physicians,  who  had  been  won 
over,  declared  that  he  must  not  speak  to  the  king  of  the  sacra- 
ment on  the  risk  of  killing  him,  in  the  condition  of  suppuration 
in  which  he  then  was.  Before  this  menacing  declaration  the 
grand  almoner  of  France  himself,  the  Cardinal  de  la  Roche- 
Aymon,  dared  not  mention  the  sacraments,  but  held  himself 
ready  to  come  forward  when  needed. 

Suddenly,  by  one  of  those  turns  whereby  God  often  foils  the 
calculations  of  men,  the  event  so  feared  by  some,  so  desired  by 
others,  occurred.  On  Wednesday,  May  4,  feeling  the  disease 
increase,  the  king  called  for  Cardinal  de  la  Roche-Aymon,  and 
asked  him  what  was  his  malady,  the  name  of  which  they  had 
hitherto  concealed  from  him.  When  he  learned  that  it  was  small- 
pox, he  said,  "  One  does  not  recover  from  that  at  my  age ;  I  must 
put  my  affairs  in  order." 

He  sent  for  Madame  du  Barry.  "  Madame,"  he  said,  "  as  I  am 
contemplating  receiving  the  sacrament,  it  is  not  proper  for  you 
to  remain  here,  as  I  do  not  wish  the  occurrence  at  Metz  to  be 
repeated,  and  desire  to  avoid  all  scandal.  Arrange  your  retreat 
with  the  Due  d'Aiguillon;  I  have  given  him  orders  to  see  that 
"you  lack  for  nothing."  That  same  day  at  four  o'clock  the  favour- 
ite departed  in  the  carriage  of  the  Duchesse  d'Aiguillon,  who 
conducted  her  to  a  country  house  belonging  to  the  duke  at  Rueil. 
There,  two  leagues  from  Versailles,  she  waited,  informed  of  every 
detail  by  the  minister,  and  ready  to  return  if  the  king  improved. 

But  the  king  did  not  improve.  In  vain  the  doctors  issued  sat- 
isfactory bulletins;  these  reassuring  declarations  deceived  no 
one :  the  public,  who  had  no  longer  anything  but  contempt  for 
that  monarch  whom  it  had  once  so  tenderly  loved,  received  the 
news  with  indifference,  if  not  with  joy;  the  courtiers  discounted 
the  future.  "  All  those  who  could  enter  the  chamber  were  there, 
as  if  to  witness  a  curious  and  somewhat  ridiculous  show.  Every 
one  watched  all  that  occurred,  either  to  write  of  it  or  to  be  able 
to  talk  of  it;  they  even  jested  about  it."  In  certain  circles  wishes 


DEATH    OF    LOUIS    XV.  93 

for  the  death  of  the  king  were  almost  openly  expressed;  the  agi- 
tation of  the  court  was  extreme;  the  rumours,  the  manoeuvres, 
the  intrigues,  increased  on  all  sides ;  the  different  parties  sought 
a  chance  to  interview  the  confessor,  who,  however,  remained  inac- 
cessible. Some  courtiers,  turning  toward  the  rising  sun,  made 
efforts  to  approach  the  young  royal  family;  they  were  repulsed 
without  pity. 

In  the  midst  of  all  these  intrigues  and  despite  the  rapid  pro- 
gress of  the  malady  and  occasional  periods  of  delirium,  the  king 
preserved  his  self-possession  and  courage.  Several  times  he 
demanded  his  confessor.  During  the  night  of  the  6th  and  /th, 
at  half-past  two  in  the  morning,  he  said  to  the  Due  de  Duras, 
who  was  watching  by  him,  "  This  is  the  third  time  that  I  have 
asked  for  my  confessor;  is  the  Abbe  Maudoux  not  here?"  He 
fell  into  a  stupor  for  a  while ;  awakening  again  at  the  end  of  half 
an  hour,  he  inquired  once  more  if  the  Abbe  Maudoux  had  not 
arrived.  The  latter  entered  ;  and  the  courtiers,  ever  on  the  alert, 
took  note,  with  watch  in  hand,  that  he  remained  with  the  august 
invalid  sixteen  minutes.  When  the  priest  went  out,  the  king  de- 
clared that  he  should  receive  the  sacrament  on  the  following  day; 
but  when  his  physician,  La  Martiniere,  observed  that  he  would 
better  do  so  at  once,  he  determined  to  receive  it  on  that  very 
day. 

At  five  o'clock  Louis-  XV.  sent  for  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  and 
spoke  to  him  in  a  low  voice.  It  was  immediately  surmised  that 
he  had  given  orders  for  the  departure  of  the  favourite,  and  the 
rumour  spread  that  the  confessor  had  made  this  departure  a  con- 
dition of  absolution.  Was  there  any  truth  in  this  rumour?  That 
is  a  secret  which  God  alone  knows.  It  was  noticed  only  that  on 
three  different  occasions  the  king  called  for  the  Abbe  Maudoux, 
and  that  he  awaited  the  sacrament  with  the  greatest  impatience, 
sending  the  Prince  de  Beauvau  several  times  to  the  window  to  see 
if  the  grand  almoner  had  not  arrived. 

At  seven  o'clock  Cardinal  de  la  Roche-Aymon  appeared, 
bringing  the  viaticum.  The  troops  were  under  arms  ;  in  obedi- 
ence to  the  formal  prohibition  of  their  grandfather,  the  dauphin 
and  his  brothers  only  followed  the  holy  sacrament  as  far  as  the 
foot  of  the  staircase ;  Mesdames  accompanied  it  to  the  bed- 
chamber, where  the  princes  of  the  blood  and  the  ministers  were 
assembled.  As  soon  as  he  saw  the  grand  almoner,  the  invalid 
felt  revive  within  him  all  the  faith  which  forty  years  of  disorderly 


94  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

living  had  not  been  able  to  extinguish;  he  threw  off  the  bed- 
clothes, uncovered  himself,  and  tried  to  kneel  down,  joining  his 
hands  together  so  fervently  that  it  brought  tears  to  all  eyes. 
When  they  tried  to  stop  him,  he  cried,  "  When  the  good  God 
honours  a  miserable  sinner  like  me  by  coming  to  him,  the  least 
that  I  can  do  is  to  receive  him  with  respect."  After  he  had  re- 
ceived the  communion,  he  made  a  sign  to  the  grand  almoner,  who, 
turning  to  the  assembled  courtiers,  said,  "  Messieurs,  the  king 
commands  me  to  say,  being  unable  to  speak  himself,  that  he 
repents  of  his  sins,  and  that  if  he  has  scandalized  his  people  he  is 
sorry  for  it ;  that  he  is  firmly  resolved  to  return  to  the  paths  of 
his  youth  and  to  employ  the  remainder  of  his  life  in  the  defence 
of  religion."  When  the  grand  almoner  spoke  of  the  remorse 
which  the  king  felt  for  the  scandals  of  his  life,  "  Monsieur  le 
cardinal,"  interrupted  the  dying  man,  turning  himself  painfully 
on  his  pillow, —  "  Monsieur  le  cardinal,  repeat  those  words ;  repeat 
them." 

With  this  expression  of  repentance,  which  was  late  but  gen- 
uine, and  in  the  exercise  of  an  edifying  and  sincere  piety,  ended 
that  royal  existence,  so  culpable  before  God  and  man.  His  con- 
temporaries, even  the  least  religious,  were  struck  by  his  repent- 
ance, by  the  steadfastness  with  which  he  sustained  the  moving 
ceremonial,  and  "  the  tranquillity,  the  patience,  the  sweetness,  the 
courage,  with  which  he  resolved  to  fulfil  his  duties ;  "  and  Ma- 
dame Louise  wrote  to  the  Abbe  Bertin,  "  I  am  so  consoled  when 
I  think  of  the  singular  favour  vouchsafed  to  the  king  in  his  last 
moments,  and  which  he  seems  to  have  profited  by  so  well,  that  if 
it  depended  upon  me  to  recall  him  to  life,  I  confess  that  I  should 
not  wish  to  plunge  him  again  into  the  midst  of  dangers  and  risk 
his  soul  a  second  time." 

After  the  /th  the  disease  grew  worse ;  on  the  Qth  all  hope  was 
given  up.  The  dauphin  requested  the  prayers  of  the  archbishop 
of  Paris,  and  ordered  the  comptroller-general  to  send  two  hun- 
dred thousand  francs  to  the  poor  of  the  capital,  enjoining  him  to 
take  that  sum  from  his  allowance  and  that  of  the  dauphiness.  In 
the  evening  the  bishop  of  Senlis,  grand  almoner,  administered 
extreme  unction.  On  the  morrow,  at  eleven  o'clock,  the  death- 
struggle  began.  The  grand  almoner  recited  the  prayers  for  the 
dying,  and  on  that  same  day,  May  10,  between  three  and  four 
o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  just  as  the  cardinal  pronounced  the 
words  proficiscere,  anima  Christiana,  Louis  XV.,  devoured  by  the 


DEATH    OF    LOUIS   XV.  95 


infection,  his  body  already  falling  into  decay,  but  his  soul  stead- 
fast, preserving  to  the  end  his  presence  of  mind,  and  manifesting 
to  the  last  evidences  of  Christian  repentance,  expired  in  the 
midst  of  universal  indifference.  A  candle  placed  in  one  of  the 
windows  of  Lhe  chateau  informed  France  that  his  long  reign  of 
sixty  years  was  over,  and  every  one  prepared  hastily  to  depart. 
At  that  moment,  an  eye-witness  recounts,  there  was  a  terrible 
noise  exactly  resembling  thunder  heard  in  the  front  room  of  the 
apartment;  it  was  the  crowd  of  courtiers  deserting  the  ante- 
chamber of  the  dead  sovereign  to  greet  the  new  power  of  Louis 
XVI. 


CHAPTER   IX. 

BEGINNING  OF  THE  REIGN  OF  Louis  XVI.  —  DIFFICULTIES  OF  THE  SITUA- 
TION.—  THE  HOPES  OF  THE  PUBLIC.  —  POPULARITY  OF  THE  NEW 
SOVEREIGNS. — MAUREPAS  MADE  MINISTER.  —  FALL  OF  THE  OLD  MIN- 
ISTERS.—  RETURN  OF  CHOISEUL.  —  THE  POLITIC  ATTITUDE  OF  THE 
QUEEN;  HER  REPUGNANCE  TO  BUSINESS. —  MARIA  THERESA,  MERCY, 
AND  VERMOND  URGE  HER  TO  ATTEND  TO  IT.  —  MARIE  ANTOINETTE 
RESISTS  THEIR  ADVICE. —  SUPPERS  AT  THE  COURT.  —  ETIQUETTE. — 
THE  QUEEN  EMANCIPATES  HERSELF  FROM  IT.  —  THE  INCONVENIENCES 
THAT  RESULT  FROM  THIS  FREEDOM.  —  THE  INOCULATION  OF  THE 
KING. 

IT  is  told  that  when  the  Comtesse  de  Noailles,  who  was  the  first 
to  enter  the  apartment  of  the  dauphin  and  dauphiness  and 
to  greet  them  as  king  and  queen  of  France,  appeared,  Louis 
XVI.  and  Marie  Antoinette  fell  upon  their  knees  and,  weeping, 
cried,  "  O  God,  guard  us,  protect  us !  we  are  too  young  to  reign." 

It  was  the  cry  of  their  heart  and  the  cry  of  their  reason. 

The  situation  was  indeed  critical.  A  king  of  twenty,  who  had 
always  been  systematically  separated  from  affairs ;  a  queen  of 
nineteen,  who  had  no  taste  for  them ;  a  court  divided ;  finances 
ruined;  no  prestige  abroad;  inextricable  difficulties  at  home, 
which  had  been  daily  aggravated  by  the  indifference  of  Louis 
XV. ;  and  with  all  this,  a  public  which  was  the  more  exacting  as 
the  reforms  were  imperative,  and  entertaining  the  most  impatient 
hopes, —  ah!  Maria  Theresa  had  good  reason  to  say,  "  I  am  dis- 
tressed, truly  distressed ;  the  burden  is  too  great." 

Among  the  populace  all  was  joy  and  hope.  They  expected 
much  of  that  young  prince,  whom  they  knew  to  be  serious,  dili- 
gent, kindly,  under  his  timid  exterior;  they  expected  still  more 
of  that  young  princess,  who  had  always  been  so  beautiful  and  so 
good.  The  first  acts  of  the  new  sovereigns  but  increased  the 
confidence  and  exalted  the  enthusiasm.  The  king  gave  up  his 
right  to  the  accession  jewels ;  the  queen  renounced  her  right  to 
the  girdle,  and  she  accompanied  this  renunciation  with  the  charm- 


THE    NEW    SOVEREIGNS.  97 

ing  saying,  "  No  one  wears  girdles  nowadays."  "  Resurrexit"  was 
graven  under  the  statue  of  Henry  IV.  In  all  the  windows  the 
portrait  of  the  young  monarch  was  placed  between  that  of  Henry 
IV.  and  of  Louis  XII.  with  these  words,  "XII.  and  IV.  make  XVI." 
Voltaire  wrote  to  Frederick  II.,  "We  have  a  young  king,  who,  to  be 
sure,  though  he  does  not  write  verse,  writes  excellent  prose ;  "  and 
Cresset,  complimenting  the  queen  in  the  name  of  the  Academy, 
spoke  of  "  the  universal  delight,  the  affectionate  acclamations, 
that  preceded,  accompanied,  and  followed  her  steps." 

With  that  exquisite  delicacy  of  heart  which  was  one  of  her 
charms,  Marie  Antoinette,  among  her  first  visits,  went  to  see  Ma- 
dame Louise,  so  cruelly  afflicted  by  the  death  of  her  father  and 
the  illness  of  her  sisters. 

"  The  queen,  on  embracing  the  Carmelite,"  an  eye-witness  relates,  "  held 
her  for  a  long  time  in  her  arms  without  being  able  to  speak  to  her,  except 
by  her  tears.  These  were  so  abundant  that  they  caused  ours  to  flow,  and 
those  of  all  who  witnessed  them  ;  our  august  mother,  who  was  broken- 
hearted, could  scarcely  pronounce  a  few  disconnected  words.  Her  niece 
perceived  this,  and  bore  the  whole  burden  of  the  interview  herself.  She 
had  the  tact  to  talk  to  her  of  the  sentiments  of  tenderness  which  her 
nephew  felt  for  her,  without  once  giving  him  the  title  of  king,  —  an  attention 
which  our  august  mother  remarked  with  pleasure.  '  My  aunt,'  Marie  An- 
toinette said  to  her,  '  in  all  that  you  require,  address  yourself  to  me.  I  will 
tell  him  of  it ;  I  will  beg  him,  I  will  engage  him  to  grant  it.  I  know  him  ; 
he  loves  you,  and  will  do  anything  to  please  you.  When  you  feel  suffi- 
ciently strong  to  receive  him,  send  me  word ;  I  will  bring  him  to  you.' " 

What  she  was  to  her  aunt  she  was  to  every  one.  "  Those  who 
return  from  Choisy  tell  marvellous  things  of  the  king  and  queen," 
a  chronicler  writes.  At  La  Muette,  whither  the  court  was  trans- 
ferred after  the  sojourn  at  Choisy,  the  queen  received  every  one 
with  her  accustomed  graciousness  ;  many  people  who  had  injured 
her  during  the  preceding  reign  approached  her  with  fear;  she 
manifested  neither  humour  nor  resentment  toward  them ;  the 
queen  did  not  avenge  the  injuries  of  the  dauphiness.  From  La 
Muette  she  often  went  to  walk  in  the  Bois  de  Boulogne.  One 
day,  perceiving  an  old  man  who  was  working,  she  approached 
him  and  questioned  him  kindly.  When  Madame  de  Noailles 
tried  to  expostulate  with  her  on  the  inconvenience  of  such  famil- 
iarity, the  queen  brusquely  turned  her  back  to  her;  and  the  king, 
to  whom  the  lady  of  honour,  so  they  say,  complained,  contented 
himself  with  replying  dryly,  "The  queen  must  be  allowed  to  do 
VOL.  i.  —  7 


98  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

as  she  pleases  and  to  speak  to  whom  she  wishes."  He  himself 
had  desired  that  the  gates  of  the  Bois  de  Boulogne,  which  were 
habitually  locked,  should  be  left  open;  and  he  walked  there,  as 
his  wife  did,  in  the  midst  of  an  immense  concourse  of  people  who 
were  never  tired  of  seeing  and  blessing  him,  whom  they  called 
Louis  the  Desired.  It  is  related  that  he  observed  in  all  things  the 
strictest  economy,  and  that  he  began  a  reform  in  the  matter  of 
amusements,  and  what  cost  him  more,  put  down  two  hunting 
establishments,  —  that  of  the  deer  and  of  the  boar ;  he  ordered  the 
lieutenant  of  police,  Sartines,  to  pay  the  arrears  of  all  debts  for 
nurses ;  it  was  said  that  he  only  desired  one  thing,  to  be  informed 
of  whatever  evil  was  said  of  him,  in  order  to  correct  it ;  and  finally 
that  he  had  a  list  made  out  of  all  the  honest  men  of  the  kingdom 
which  he  kept  always  before  his  eyes  when  he  had  any  appoint- 
ment to  make.  "  He  barricades  himself  with  honest  men,"  the 
ambassador  from  Sweden  wrote  energetically.  And  the  prince 
himself  said  to  the  Due  de  Noailles,  when  he  wished  to  retire 
because  of  his  age,  "Do  not  leave  me;  I  have  need  of  honest 
men  about  me  who  will  point  out  my  duty  to  me." 

Immediate  and  important  satisfaction  was  given  to  the  public 
conscience.  On  the  day  following  the  death  of  Louis  XV.,  the 
favourite  was  exiled  to  the  convent  of  the  Bernardines  of  Pont- 
aux-Dames,  near  Macon.  Her  brother-in-law,  the  Comte  Jean 
du  Barry,  the  principal  author  of  the  various  intrigues,  was  sen- 
tenced to  be  arrested,  and  only  escaped  Vincennes  by  a  precipi- 
tate flight  to  England.  The  coldness  which  the  queen  exhibited 
in  public  to  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  presaged  his  approaching  fall, 
and  rumour  repeated  with  glee  a  saying  attributed  to  the  young 
sovereign :  some  one  having  said  in  her  presence,  "  This  is  the 
hour  when  the  king  should  enter  the  council  with  his  ministers," 
"With  those  of  the  late  king,"  she  replied  quickly. 

"  Every  one  is  in  ecstasy,  every  one  is  wild  about  you,"  the 
empress  wrote  to  Marie  Antoinette ;  "  they  expect  the  greatest 
happiness.  You  have  revived  a  nation  which  was  in  extremity, 
and  which  was  alone  sustained  by  its  affection  for  its  princes." 
But  to  her  faithful  ambassador  she  was  less  confident;  her 
political  acumen  did  not  allow  her  to  deceive  herself  concerning 
the  perils  of  the  moment.  "  The  situation  of  the  king,  of  the 
ministers,  and  even  of  the  State  exhibits  nothing  that  is  reas- 
suring," she  said;  and  with  the  mysterious  presentiment  which 
sometimes  illumines  the  heart  of  a  mother,  she  added  this  char- 


Louis  XV. 


THE    COMTE    DE    MAUREPAS.  99 

acteristic  phrase  concerning  the  future  of  her  daughter,  which 
events  were  to  justify  but  too  truly,  "  I  fear  her  happy  days  are 
over." 

In  fact,  the  intrigues  and  machinations  which  had  surrounded 
to  the  very  last  the  death-bed  of  Louis  XV.  were  transferred  with- 
out loss  of  heat  or  pertinacity  to  the  foot  of  the  throne  of  Louis 
XVI.  While  the  corpse  of  the  old  king  was  being  carried  in  the 
night,  and  without  pomp  or  following,  to  St.  Denys,  in  the  midst 
of  the  maledictions  and  insults  of  the  crowd,  the  courtiers  were 
quarrelling  bitterly  at  Versailles  for  power  and  office.  "  The 
intrigues  of  the  new  court  are  abominable,"  the  Abbe  Baudeau 
wrote,  "  and  one  would  have  to  be  more  than  an  archangel  to 
escape  them." 

Who  was  to  have  control?  Who  was  to  be  prime  minister? 
This  was  the  territory  for  which  the  two  parties  waged  war.  Mes- 
dames,  who,  despite  all  rules  of  prudence,  had  followed  the  royal 
family  to  Choisy,  —  Mesdames,  whose  influence  over  their  feeble 
nephew  Mercy  feared,  were,  to  be  sure,  separated  from  the  court 
by  the  small-pox  which  they  had  caught  at  the  bedside  of  their 
father;  but  before  being  laid  low  by  the  malady,  Madame  Ade- 
la'fde  had  had  time  to  fire  a  last  shot  which  was  to  deal  a  mortal 
wound  to  the  entire  reign :  she  succeeded  in  having  an  uncle 
of  the  Due  d'Aiguillon,  the  Comte  de  Maurepas,  preferred  to 
Choiseul,  whom  the  queen  desired,  or  to  Machault,  who  had  first 
been  thought  of,  or  to  Sartines,  whom  the  king  had  sent  for  dur- 
ing the  first  hour.  And  making  use  with  fatal  cleverness  of  the 
remnants  of  her  influence,  which  was  about  to  disappear,  but  to 
which  her  devotion  during  the  illness  of  Louis  XV.  had  given  new 
life,  it  was  through  Marie  Antoinette  herself,  who  was  ignorant 
and  too  confiding,  that  she  proposed  this  choice  to  Louis  XVI. 
Called  to  the  cabinet  of  the  young  monarch  as  simple  adviser, 
Maurepas  came  out  prime  minister,  if  not  in  name,  at  least  in 
fact. 

Born  in  1701,  secretary  of  state  at  twenty-four,  then  dismissed 
in  1/49  for  having  offended  Madame  de  Pompadour,  Maurepas 
had  since  that  time  lived  at  a  distance  from  the  government. 
He  resumed  office  at  the  end  of  twenty-five  years,  without  hesi- 
tancy and  without  concern  for  the  difficulties  that  had  gathered 
since  his  fall.  Witty  and  astute,  but  careless  and  frivolous,  more 
accustomed  to  composing  songs  than  to  considering  serious 
things,  so  little  serious  himself  that  in  order  to  get  on  with  him 


100  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

in  business  it  was  necessary  to  assume  an  air  of  gayety,  a  man  of 
expedients  rather  than  a  man  of  principles,  less  dexterous  in 
solving  difficulties  than  in  eluding  them,  he  had  but  one  aim :  to 
assure  his  repose  and  that  of  the  king  by  avoiding  all  that  might 
frighten  the  timid  good-nature  of  the  young  prince.  It  is  asserted 
that  Louis  XVI.  had  called  him  simply  to  consult  him;  his  nafve 
confidence  was  surprised  by  the  trickery  of  the  old  courtier,  who 
was  first  insinuating  and  soon  imposing.  "  Your  Majesty  makes 
me  prime  minister,  then,"  Maurepas  had  said.  "  No,"  replied 
the  king,  "that  is  not  my  intention."  "I  understand,"  the  old 
man  had  answered ;  "  your  Majesty  wishes  me  to  teach  him  how 
to  do  without  one,"  and  he  entered  the  council. 

Public  opinion  was  impatient;  with  that  inconsiderate  ardour 
which  is  too  often  characteristic  of  our  nation,  it  desired  the  dis- 
missal of  all  who  had  been  in  power  on  the  previous  day,  the 
recall  of  the  exiles,  and  the  accomplishment  of  every  reform 
within  twenty-four  hours.  "  I  am  uneasy  at  this  French  enthu- 
siasm," Marie  Antoinette  wrote  with  great  good  sense  to  her 
mother;  "  it  will  be  impossible  to  content  every  one  in  a  coun- 
try where  they  are  eager  to  have  everything  done  in  a  moment." 
If  the  wise  and  politic  heads  thought  it  best  to  keep  the  ministers 
of  the  late  king  for  a  time  to  finish  the  business  already  in  hand, 
and  to  reflect  before  making  necessary  changes,  the  public,  ex- 
cited by  pamphlets  and  songs,  would  hear  nothing  of  these 
delays  and  these  arrangements.  It  talked  of  nothing  but  of 
hanging  the  comptroller-general,  and  the  popular  refrain  sent 
the  chancellor,  Maupeou, 

"  On  the  route, 
On  the  route, 
On  the  route  to  Chatou." 

Only  fifteen  days  after  the  accession  of  Louis  XVI.,  a  chroni- 
cler, expressing  the  feverish  impatience  of  the  capital,  wrote  that 
their  great  hopes  were  beginning  to  cool.  On  the  2d  of  June, 
however,  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  handed  in  his  resignation  as  secre- 
tary of  state  for  foreign  affairs,  but  thanks  to  h'is  uncle  Mau- 
repas, found  means  to  have  granted  to  him  a  gratuity  of  five 
hundred  thousand  francs,  which  excited  serious  discontent.  By 
an  act  of  clemency  which  was  opposed  to  all  ministerial  traditions, 
D'Aiguillon  after  his  dismissal  was  not  exiled ;  he  remained  at 
court,  where  he  used  the  favour  which  he  had  received  from 
his  sovereigns  against  them,  and  became  one  of  their  most  im- 


RETURN   OF   CHOISEUL.  IOI 

placable  enemies  and  one  of  the  most  dangerous  calumniators 
of  Marie  Antoinette. 

It  was  the  queen,  who,  despite  Mercy,  had  effected  the  dismissal 
of  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  ;  but  there  her  power  ceased :  she  was  not 
able  to  have  him  replaced  by  Choiseul.  The  most  that  she  could 
obtain  was  the  termination  of  the  exile  of  the  old  adversary  of 
Madame  du  Barry.  Moreover,  she  was  obliged  to  use  every  means 
in  her  power  to  compass  so  much.  The  king  seemed  as  little  dis- 
posed to  recall  Choiseul  to  court  as  to  recall  him  to  the  ministry. 
Though  sceptical  regarding  the  absurd  rumours  of  poisoning 
which  had  once  been  current,  he  could  not  pardon  the  ancient 
minister  for  the  long  and  violent  wrangles  which  he  had  had  with 
the  dauphin,  his  father.  Perhaps  also,  as  some  one  has  justly 
remarked,  the  young  prince,  who  was  timid,  credulous,  and  chaste, 
felt  a  repugnance  to  that  brilliant  mind,  which  was  prompt  and 
adventurous,  and  to  the  light  manners  of  him  who  had  expelled 
the  Jesuits.  But  the  queen  insisted,  even  exacted,  alleging  that 
it  was  humiliating  not  to  be  able  to  obtain  a  favour  for  the  man 
who  had  negotiated  her  marriage.  "  If  you  invoke  such  a  reason," 
Louis  XVI.  replied,  "  I  can  refuse  you  nothing."  Choiseul  received 
permission  to  quit  Touraine  and  to  return  to  Paris. 

He  arrived  on  June  12,  in  the  evening,  and  betook  himself 
on  the  I3th  to  La  Muette,  where  the  royal  family  was  stopping; 
but  if  the  ancient  minister  flattered  himself  that  he  was  to  resume 
his  power,  he  was  promptly  undeceived.  The  king  appeared 
embarrassed  on  seeing  him.  "  You  have  grown  fat,  Monsieur 
de  Choiseul,"  he  said  to  him;  "you  are  losing  your  hair, — you 
are  becoming  bald."  The  queen  showered  smiles  and  amiable 
words  upon  him  in  vain.  She  could  not  efface  the  impression 
produced  by  such  a  reception.  Despite  her  amiability,  despite 
the  attentions  of  the  princes  of  the  blood  and  of  the  ministers, 
despite  the  acclamations  of  the  people,  the  blow  had  struck 
home :  on  Tuesday,  the  I4th,  at  eight  o'clock  in  the  morning, 
Choiseul  returned  to  Chanteloup. 

This  recall  was  for  Marie  Antoinette  a  question  of  sentiment 
rather  than  of  politics.  She  desired  to  have  Choiseul  minister 
from  gratitude,  despite  her  mother,  who  was  not  anxious  to  see 
so  active  and  vigilant  a  man  at  the  head  of  foreign  affairs. 
Choiseul  being  definitely  set  aside,  she  concerned  herself  little 
with  the  person  who  might  succeed  the  Due  d'Aiguillon.  She 
always  exhibited  an  extreme  reluctance  to  meddle  with  business. 


102  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

"  She  keeps  out  of  it,"  said  some  one  who  knew  her  well,  "  both 
from  principle  and  from  inclination."  Was  it  indolence  of  mind, 
vivacity  of  character,  or  antipathy  to  serious  things?  Had  she  a 
secret  instinct  of  the  danger  of  taking  part  in  politics  that  always 
exists  for  a  woman  who  is  still  young,  a  foreigner  by  birth,  and  ill- 
prepared  by  her  education  for  any  such  occupation,  at  a  court 
given  up  to  faction,  like  that  of  Versailles,  and  amid  a  discon- 
tented and  hot-headed  people,  like  the  French?  Did  she  say  to 
herself  that,  save  in  exceptional  circumstances,  or  when  possessed 
of  genius,  such  as  her  mother  had,  and  which  was  given  to  but 
few,  the  part  of  a  queen  consisted  rather  in  holding  court  than 
in  directing  affairs,  and  that  that  role  was  sufficiently  great  and 
sufficiently  delicate? 

But  were  not  the  circumstances  exceptional?  Was  an  absolute 
abstention  possible;  was  it  desirable?  Among  the  counsellors  of 
the  queen  opinion  wa?  divided. 

Joseph  II.,  whose  judgment  was  often  safe  where  the  affairs 
of  others  were  concerned,  wrote  anxiously  to  Leopold,  "  I  hope 
that  all  may  go  well,  and,  above  all,  that  our  sister  will  have  noth- 
ing to  do  with  the  intrigues  of  the  court.  I  have  written  her  to 
this  end ;  "  and  he  added  later,  "  God  grant  that  my  advice  may  be 
of  use  and  bear  fruit ;  but  you  observe  very  truly  that  to  per- 
severe in  the  determination  of  abstaining  from  taking  part  will 
not  be  easy  and  will  require  a  consistency  and  exactitude  of  con- 
duct of  which  so  young  a  person  is  scarcely  capable.  I  have 
preached  the  necessity  of  it  to  her,  and  perhaps  I  am  the  only 
one  who  has.  I  do  not  guarantee  that  others  whom  we  respect 
will  preserve  the  same  tenor  in  their  letters." 

Joseph  II.  did  not  deceive  himself;  Maria  Theresa,  who  had 
at  first  had  a  presentiment  of  the  dangers  which  surrounded  the 
young  queen,  and  who  had  written  to  Mercy,  "  I  do  not  write  to 
my  daughter  but  on  general  subjects,  counselling  her  always  to 
listen  to  you,  to  follow  your  advice,  and  to  be  careful  not  to  inter- 
fere ;  that  she  should  be  the  confidante  and  friend  of  the  king,  but 
should  not  seem  to  wish  to  govern  with  him  ;  that  she  should 
avoid  all  applause  which  excites  envy  and  jealousy  against  her. 
Her  position  is  very  delicate,  and  at  nineteen  !  My  only  hope  is 
in  you,"  -  -  Maria  Theresa,  on  the  very  day  that  she  addressed 
these  sage  reflections  to  her  ambassador,  wrote  to  her  daughter 
in  a  different  tone;  she  laid  out  for  her  a  plan  of  conduct  in 
politics,  joining  thereto  the  most  lively  exhortations  on  the  neces- 


MARIA   THERESA'S   ADVICE.  103 

sity  of  strengthening  the  Franco-Austrian  alliance,  and  that  in 
terms  the  most  likely  to  move' the  heart  and  fire  the  imagination 
of  the  young  sovereign  :  — 

"  The  interests,  not  only  of  our  hearts,  but  of  our  States,  are  so  infinitely 
bound  up  in  one  another,  that  to  further  them  we  must  work  together  on 
the  intimate  footing  of  which  the  late  king  sought  to  lay  the  foundation, 
and  continue  to  do  so,  notwithstanding  the  various  changes  that  have 
taken  place. 

"  From  my  dear  children  I  may  well  expect  as  much ;  any  diminution 
of  harmony  would  kill  rne.  Our  two  monarchies  need  repose  to  arrange 
our  affairs.  If  we  act  in  concert,  no  one  will  disturb  our  work,  and  Europe 
will  enjoy  happiness  and  tranquillity.  Not  only  will  our  people  be  happy, 
but  also  even  those  who  seek  a  disturbance  in  the  belief  that  it  would  be  to 
their  personal  advantage.  The  first  twenty  years  of  my  reign  are  a  proof  of 
this,  and  since  our  happy  alliance,  which  has  been  cemented  by  so  many 
of  the  tenderest  ties,  this  peace  is  beginning  to  be  established  May  it 
continue  for  many  years  !  Mercy  will  inform  you  of  all  that  concerns  our 
affairs  in  general ;  I  do  not  leave  him  in  ignorance  of  anything." 

Is  this  not  a  distinct  avowal  that  Vienna  counted  upon  guiding 
the  policy  on  all  important  points,  and  that  the  empress  pro- 
posed to  make  her  daughter  her  chief  agent  at  Versailles?  Who 
can  doubt  it,  when  two  days  later,  Maria  Theresa  had  a  memoir 
of  the  Prince  von  Kaunitz  forwarded  to  Marie  Antoinette,  which 
was  to  serve  her  as  a  guide  for  directing  her  husband  on  the 
various  political  questions  of  the  day?  Was  the  empress  igno- 
rant of  the  prejudices  which  the  alliance  made  by  Choiseul  still 
aroused  in  France,  and  had  she  already  forgotten  that  after  the 
death  of  Louis  XV.,  her  faithful  ambassador  was  obliged  to  ab- 
stain from  appearing  at  court  for  some  time,  in  order  to  escape 
the  untimely  and  antagonistic  remarks  which  were  made  con- 
cerning the  intentions  of  the  cabinet  of  Vienna  to  govern  that  of 
Versailles  ? 

As  for  Mercy,  though  he  did  not  disguise  to  himself  the  obsta- 
cles which  his  august  pupil  would  encounter,  nor  take  into  exclu- 
sive consideration  the  Austrian  policy,  as  Maria  Theresa  did,  he 
had  always  thought  that  the  queen  should  keep  her  eyes  open  to 
the  affairs  of  France.  The  more  he  noted  of  the  feeble,  timid, 
hesitating  character  of  the  dauphin  since  he  had  become  king, 
the  more  was  he  convinced  that  this  character  had  need  of  direc- 
tion, and  that  he  had  not  sufficient  resolution  to  decide  anything 


104  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

alone,  and  that  he  was  bound  to  fall  under  some  one's  influence ; 
and  that  taking  it  all  together,  if  such  were  to  be  the  case,  it 
would  be  better  for  this  influence  to  spring  from  his  wife  than 
from  his  aunts  or  from  any  one  else. 

"  If  during  this  first  period  the  king  allows  himself  to  be  governed,"  the 
ambassador  wrote  on  the  i  yth  of  May,  "  and  the  public  perceives  that 
Mesdames  enjoy  this  advantage,  the  credit  of  the  queen  will  receive  a 
mortal  blow.  I  have  implored  her  to  be  very  circumspect  in  interfering 
in  affairs,  but  also  not  to  allow  any  one  of  the  family  to  meddle  in  such 
matters. 

'•  The  king,  who  has,  I  believe,  some  solid  qualities,  has,  however,  few 
amiable  ones.  His  manners  are  rough  ;  and  the  details  of  business  excite 
his  temper  at  moments.  The  queen  must  learn  to  bear  with  these  out- 
bursts ;  her  happiness  depends  upon  it.  She  is  loved  by  her  husband ; 
with  moderation,  good-nature,  and  caresses,  she  can  acquire  an  absolute 
empire  over  the  king ;  but  she  must  govern  without  seeming  to  wish  to 
govern." 

A  month  later  he  wrote  again  :  — 

"  Everything  depends  on  this  princess  —  the  queen  —  being  willing  to 
surmount  her  repugnance  to  everything  serious,  on  her  deigning  to  listen 
with  attention  and  to  reflect  a  little  upon  what  is  laid  before  her  of  this 
nature.  Her  natural  intelligence  and  discernment  will  always  make  her 
act  rightly,  whether  with  regard  to  things  or  circumstances. 

"  But  she  must  consider  these  great  facts  :  first,  that  the  king  is  of  a  some- 
what weak  character ;  second,  that  consequently  some  one  will  take  pos- 
session of  him  ;  third,  that  under  all  circumstances  the  queen  must  never 
lose  sight  for  an  instant  of  every  means  to  assure  her  entire  and  exclusive 
ascendancy  over  the  mind  of  her  husband." 

The  opinion  of  the  second  intimate  counsellor  of  Marie  Antoi- 
nette, Vermond,  did  not  differ  from  that  of  Mercy  :  — 

"  I  desire  rather  than  hope  that  the  queen  may  listen  to  and  take  a 
sufficient  interest  in  business  affairs  to  support  and  augment  the  confidence 
of  her  august  husband  in  her.  Since  he  has  ascended  the  throne,  he 
really  occupies  himself  a  great  deal  with  them  ;  it  is  impossible  for  him  to 
have  great  confidence  in  the  queen  without  speaking  to  her  of  them,  but 
he  will  not  continue  to  do  so  if  she  does  not  try  to  understand  them  and 
talk  sensibly  about  them.  The  queen  herself  made  a  very  precious  obser- 
vation to  me ;  she  feels  that  she  would  be  unhappy  should  any  disagree- 
ment arise  between  the  two  courts.  '  How  could  I  prevent  it,'  she  said  to 
me,  '  if  I  am  never  to  have  anything  to  do  with  business  ? ' 


HUNTING-SUPPERS.  105 

"  I  know  well  that  she  must  never  take  part  in  particular  intrigues ;  but 
I  believe  that  she  should  know  the  principal  sources  of  them.  I  know, 
too,  that  it  would  be  dangerous  for  her  to  exercise  any  daily  influence 
upon  details ;  but  to  bring  her  to  this  point,  she  would  have  to  change 
from  head  to  foot,  and  who  could  compass  that  ?  " 

Thus  everything  urged  Marie  Antoinette,  despite  her  instinc- 
tive repulsion,  to  concern  herself  with  business ;  everything,  from 
the  character  of  her  husband,  who  needed  to  be  led,  to  her  mother, 
who  insinuated  the  necessity  of  it,  while  having  the  air  of  preach- 
ing the  contrary,  to  her  daily  counsellors,  Mercy  and  Vermond, 
who  at  least  advised  it  frankly.  Despite  their  advice  and  insist- 
ence, despite  even  the  remark  which  she  had  made  to  Vermond, 
her  repugnance  proved  too  strong  She  feared  the  complications 
that  might  result  from  circumstances  present  and  to  come,  and 
to  avoid  them  she  was  resolved,  at  least  in  the  beginning,  to  hold 
herself  aloof.  Her  husband,  who  submitted  involuntarily  and 
perhaps  unconsciously  to  her  charming  nature  and  character 
stronger  than  his  o\vn,  talked  to  her  gladly  of  his  business  affairs, 
and  even  consulted  her;  she  listened  to  him  with  amiability  and 
attention,  but  nothing  more.  When  Maupeou  and  Terray  fell 
before  the  displeasure  of  the  public,  the  king  did  not  wish  to 
decide  upon  their  successors  without  consulting  his  wife.  He 
sought  her  in  her  boudoir  and  confided  to  her  all  the  reasons 
existing  for  and  against  the  chancellor  and  comptroller-general. 
The  queen  listened,  but  permitted  herself  to  make  no  remark. 
She  might  have  made  ministers,  as  her  mother  desired  j  she  had 
no  wish  to  do  so. 

A  question  presently  arose  which  belonged  to  her  province 
and  absorbed  her  attention  for  the  moment. 

Court  etiquette  did  not  permit  the  queen  or  princesses  of  the 
blood  to  eat  with  men.  When  the  royal  couple  dined  in  public, 
they  were  served  by  women.  When  the  king  went  to  the  hunt, 
there  was  supper  for  the  hunters  afterward,  from  which  the  queen 
was  excluded.  Assemblies  of  this  kind  had  not  a  little  contrib- 
uted, so  it  was  said,  to  plunge  Louis  XV.  into  the  disorders  of 
his  last  years  and  to  keep  him  there.  Would  they  not  be  a  temp- 
tation for  a  prince,  who  was  virtuous,  to  be  sure,  but  young  and 
feeble ;  and  would  the  purity  of  his  mind  withstand  the  liberty 
of  language  and  action  which  those  nocturnal  parties  seemed  to 
authorize?  There  was  danger;  and  Marie  Antoinette  resolved 
to  parry  it  by  realizing  a  project  which  she  had  cherished  for  a 


106  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

year,  of  substituting  for  these  hunting-suppers  suppers  in  society 
over  which  she  should  preside,  and  to  which  she  would  invite 
the  royal  family  and  the  principal  personages  of  the  court.  Mercy 
encouraged  her,  and  all  reasonable  persons  saw  therein  the  surest 
means  of  separating  the  king  from  bad  companions.  But  it  was 
necessary  to  forestall  objections.  Might  not  Mesdames,  attached 
from  habit  and  jealousy  to  the  old  traditions,  and  still  holding 
great  sway  over  the  mind  of  their  nephew,  interdict  a  scheme 
which  would  in  their  eyes  involve  a  grave  breach  of  etiquette, 
and  give  new  proof  of  the  influence  of  their  niece  ?  To  the  first 
overtures  which  his  wife  made  to  him,  the  king  replied  but 
vaguely,  alleging  the  necessity  of  consulting  Madame  Victoire, 
not  to  say  Madame  Adelaide.  Surprised  and  displeased  at  these 
subterfuges,  Marie  Antoinette  insisted,  and  had  a  very  lively  in- 
terview with  her  husband ;  finally  she  brought  such  energy  and 
force  of  reasoning  to  bear  that  she  conquered  him.  Forthwith 
the  first  supper  was  fixed  for  the  following  Saturday,  October  22. 
Mesdames  were  absent;  when  they  returned,  the  custom  was 
established,  and  the  old  princesses  had  no  other  resource  but  to 
ask  permission  to  assist  at  these  reunions  which  they  had  at  first 
disapproved  of. 

The  innovation  was  favourably  received  ;  the  public  applauded  ; 
it  understood,  as  a  chronicler  said,  that  it  was  not  for  the  pleas- 
ure of  supping  in  company,  but  from  well-understood  political 
and  prudential  motives,  that  the  queen  had  instituted  these  sup- 
pers. At  the  court  their  success  was  not  less  great.  It  was  soon 
necessary  instead  of  one  supper  a  week  to  have  two,  —  on  Tues- 
days and  Thursdays.  The  king  named  the  gentlemen,  the  queen 
the  ladies,  who  were  to  be  invited.  Every  one  schemed  for  the 
honour  of  being  invited,  and  departed  enraptured.  The  queen 
treated  the  guests  with  her  ordinary  affability,  and  every  day  the 
talk  of  Paris  related  some  trait  of  goodness  or  of  condescension. 
The  king  himself  enjoyed  these  assemblies,  and  his  brusque 
nature  grew  more  amiable.  Attentive  without  gallantry  to  the 
women,  kind  without  familiarity  to  the  men,  he  astonished  the 
court  by  his  affable  and  polished  bearing,  as  well  as  by  his  un- 
usual ease;  and  as  usual  it  was  to  the  queen  that  they  attributed 
this  happy  development  of  the  qualities  of  her  husband. 

The  young  princess  enjoyed  her  triumph,  and  who  knows  if 
she  did  not  see  in  the  success  of  this  first  innovation  encourage- 
ment to  undertake  others  and  to  emancipate  herself  from  the 


ETIQUETTE.  IO/ 

odious  exactions  of  etiquette?  Etiquette,  that  was  her  familiar 
enemy;  she  encountered  it  everywhere,  during  every  hour  of  the 
day,  at  every  step;  it  repressed  her  impulses,  spoiled  her  pleas- 
ures, obtruded  itself  in  her  friendships.  A  brief  sketch  of  Marie 
Antoinette's  day  at  this  epoch  will  show  how  insupportable  was 
that  excessive  regulation  which  left  no  liberty  to  any  impulse. 

The  queen  usually  awoke  at  about  eight  o'clock.  A  woman 
of  the  wardrobe  then  entered,  carrying  a  basket  which  contained 
t\vo  or  three  chemises,  some  handkerchiefs,  some  towels ;  this 
was  what  was  called  the  "  offering  "  of  the  morning.  The  first 
waiting-woman  presented  a  bock,  in  which  were  pasted  samples 
of  gowns,  full  dress,  undress,  etc.;  there  were  ordinarily  for  each 
season  twelve  full  toilets,  twelve  demi-toilets,  twelve  rich  dresses 
with  panicrs.  The  queen  marked  with  a  pin  the  garments  which 
she  chose  for  the  day,  —  a  full  dress,  an  undress  for  the  afternoon, 
an  evening  dress  for  the  play  and  for  the  supper.  The  book  of 
patterns  was  immediately  carried  away,  and  the  garments  chosen 
were  brought  in,  in  a  large  taffeta. 

The  queen  took  a  bath  nearly  every  day;  a  large  tub  was 
rolled  into  her  room,  and  the  bathers  were  admitted  with  all  the 
accessories  of  a  bath.  The  queen  wrapped  herself  in  a  long  robe 
of  English  flannel,  buttoned  to  the  bottom,  and  when  she  came 
out  of  the  bath  a  sheet  was  held  very  high  before  her  to  screen 
her  entirely  from  the  sight  of  her  women.  Then  she  returned  to 
bed  clothed  in  a  cloak  of  white  taffeta,  and  took  a  book  or  a  piece 
of  embroidery.  At  nine  o'clock  she  breakfasted  ;  on  the  days  of 
the  bath,  in  the  bath  itself  on  a  tray  placed  upon  the  lid  of  the 
tub ;  on  other  days  in  bed,  or  sometimes  on  a  little  table  placed 
before  her  sofa.  Intimates  were  then  admitted.  The  breakfast 
was  very  simple,  consisting  of  a  little  coffee  or  chocolate. 

At  noon  the  grand  toilet  took  place.  This  was  the  time  of  the 
grand fs  entrees.  Folding-chairs  were  wheeled  into  a  circle  for 
the  superintendent,  the  ladies  of  honour  and  of  the  bedchamber, 
the  governess  of  the  Children  of  France ;  the  princes  of  the  blood, 
captains  of  the  guard,  and  all  the  high  officials  who  had  entrance 
came  to  pay  their  court;  the  ladies  of  the  palace  did  not  come 
until  after  the  toilet.  The  queen  saluted  by  bowing  her  head  or 
by  a  slight  inclination,  if  it  were  a  prince  of  the  blood ;  she  leaned 
upon  her  toilet-table  to  indicate  that  she  was  about  to  rise.  The 
brothers  of  the  king  ordinarily  came  while  her  hair  was  being 
dressed.  The  toilet-table,  usually  very  elaborate  and  very  rich, 


108  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

was  drawn  to  the  middle  of  the  room.  It  was  there  that  the 
dressing  of  the  body  took  place.  The  lady  of  honour  handed 
her  her  chemise  and  poured  the  water  for  her  to  wash  her  hands ; 
the  lady  of  the  bedchamber  passed  the  skirt  of  her  gown  or  of 
her  full  dress,  arranged  her  fichu,  and  clasped  her  necklace.  It 
was  at  this  moment  that  Monsieur  Randon  of  the  Tower,  on  the 
first  of  each  month,  handed  to  the  queen,  in  a  purse  of  white 
leather  lined  with  taffeta  .and  embroidered  with  silver,  the  money 
destined  for  her  charities  or  for  her  play.  Later  Marie  Antoinette 
abolished  this  ceremonial ;  when  her  hair  was  dressed,  she  saluted 
the  ladies  who  were  in  the  room,  and  followed  only  by  her  own 
women,  entered  her  boudoir  to  dress  herself;  there  she  found  her 
modiste,  Mademoiselle  Bertin,  the  supreme  arbiter  of  fashion  and 
taste  at  that  period. 

Her  toilet  completed,  the  queen,  accompanied  by  the  superin- 
tendent, the  ladies  of  honour  and  of  the  bedchamber,  the  ladies 
of  the  palace,  her  gentlemen-in-waiting,  her  chief  equerry,  her 
clergy,  the  princesses  of  the  royal  family,  passed  through  the 
Salon  de  la  Paix  and  traversed  the  gallery  on  her  way  to  mass. 
She  heard  it  with  the  king  in  the  tribune  facing  the  high  altar 
except  on  days  of  full  service,  when  she  heard  it  below  on  a 
carpet  of  velvet  fringed  with  gold. 

After  mass  came  dinner.  The  maitre  d'Jiotcl  entered  the 
chamber  of  the  queen  and  announced  to  her  that  it  was  served, 
and  handed  to  her  the  menu.  Every  Sunday  there  was  dinner  in 
public,  in  the  cabinet  ot  the  nobles.  The  ladies  of  title  who  had 
the  privilege  sat  on  folding-chairs  at  the  two  sides  of  the  table ; 
the  ladies  without  title  remained  standing.  The  queen  dined 
alone  with  the  king;  behind  the  chair  of  the  king  stood  the  cap- 
tain of  the  guard  and  the  first  gentleman  of  the  chamber;  behind 
the  chair  of  the  queen  stood  her  gentleman-in-waiting,  her  chief 
equerry,  and  her  maitre  d'hotcl,  who  superintended  the  service 
without  leaving  his  place.  The  prince  nearest  the  crown  pre- 
sented a  bowl  to  the  king  to  wash  his  hands  at  the  moment 
when  he  sat  down  at  table;  a  princess  performed  the  same 
service  for  the  queen. 

Marie  Antoinette  ate  very  little,  of  white  meat  only,  and  never 
drank  any  wine.  At  supper  she  contented  herself  with  a  little 
bouillon,  the  wing  of  a  chicken,  and  a  glass  of  water  in  which  she 
dipped  some  little  biscuits.  On  leaving  the  dinner-table,  she  re- 
turned alone  to  her  apartment  with  her  women,  took  off  her  panic -r 


ETIQUETTE.  109 

and  the  lower  part  of  her  robe,  and  prepared  herself  for  the  duties 
of  the  evening. 

Every  detail  of  her  life,  even  the  most  intimate,  every  detail  of 
the  toilet,  even  the  form  of  a  bow  of  ribbon,  was  thus  regulated; 
each  servant  had  his  fixed  place,  and  his  service  assigned  to  him 
beforehand.  If  the  queen,  for  example,  asked  for  a  glass  of 
water,  the  lackey  presented  a  silver-gilt  platter  to  the  first  waiting- 
woman,  on  which  stood  a  covered  goblet  and  a  little  carafe;  but 
if  the  lady  of  honour  appeared,  it  was  she  who  offered  the  tray, 
and  if  Madame  or  the  Comtesse  d'Artois  happened  to  enter  at 
that  moment,  the  tray  had  to  pass  from  the  hands  of  the  lady  of 
honour  to  those  of  the  princess  before  reaching  the  queen.  Noth- 
ing was  passed  directly  to  the  sovereign ;  her  handkerchief,  her 
gloves,  were  laid  on  a  long  gold  platter  or  silver-gilt  tray  called 
the  gantttre.  It  was  the  first  woman-in-waiting  who  thus  pre- 
sented to  the  queen  anything  that  she  needed,  provided  that  a 
lady  of  the  bedchamber,  or  lady  of  honour,  or  a  princess  were 
not  present,  and  always  in  the  same  order  as  observed  for  the 
glass  of  water. 

An  anecdote  related  by  Madame  Campan  will  give  a  better 
idea  of  all  these  details,  and  of  the  insupportable  tyranny  of 
etiquette :  — 

"  One  winter  day  it  chanced  that  the  queen,  already  quite  undressed, 
was  on  the  point  of  putting  on  her  chemise.  I  held  it  all  unfolded  ;  the 
lady  of  honour  entered,  hastened  to  take  off  her  gloves,  and  took  the 
chemise.  Some  one  scratched  at  the  door.  It  opened,  and  Madame  la 
Duchesse  d'Orleans  appeared  ;  taking  off  her  gloves,  she  advanced  to  take 
the  chemise,  but  the  lady  of  honour  could  not  give  it  to  her  ;  she  returned 
it  to  me  ;  I  gave  it  to  the  princess.  Some  one  scratched  again ;  it  was 
Madame  la  Comtesse  de  Provence  ;  the  Duchesse  d'Orle'ans  presented  the 
chemise  to  her.  The  queen  held  her  arms  crossed  over  her  bosom  and 
appeared  to  be  cold.  Madame,  observing  her  painful  attitude,  contented 
herself  with  throwing  down  her  handkerchief,  kept  on  her  gloves,  and  on 
putting  on  the  chemise  disarranged  the  queen's  head-dress.  The  queen 
began  to  laugh  to  disguise  her  impatience,  but  not  before  murmuring  sev- 
eral times  between  her  teeth,  '  This  is  odious  !  what  importunity  ! ' ' 

This  is  one  among  a  thousand  instances ;  there  was  not  an  act 
in  the  life  of  the  princes  which  was  not  subjected  to  this  inflexible 
etiquette.  It  pursued  them  in  their  most  secret  intimacy,  in  their 
pleasures,  in  their  sufferings,  in  their  infirmities.  Vanity  and 
personal  interest,  which  are  ever  alive,  learned  to  make  use  of 


110  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

these  customs,  which  transformed  the  domestic  services,  even 
the  most  humble,  into  honourable  and  often  lucrative  preroga- 
tives ;  and  the  highest  nobles  knew  how  to  advance  their  fortunes 
by  means  of  their  right  to  "  give  a  glass  of  water,  to  hand  a  che- 
mise, or  to  take  out  a  basin."  "I  should  never  finish,"  said  the 
Comte  d'Hesecques,  "  if  I  recounted  all  the  little  things  that  one 
must  know,  not  only  to  be  a  perfect  courtier,  but  in  order  not  to 
make  mistakes."  The  lady  of  honour  to  the  queen,  the  Comtesse 
de  Noailles,  had  been  brought  up  with  a  respect  for  and  knowl- 
edge of  etiquette,  which  often  made  her  exaggerate  the  impor- 
tance of  it.  For  her  a  smile  contrary  to  rule  was  a  crime;  a 
bonnet-pin  misplaced  almost  made  her  fall  in  a  faint.  She 
seemed  the  personification  of  etiquette ;  and  in  a  moment  of 
good  or  perhaps  of  ill  humour,  her  royal  mistress  had  given  her  the 
nickname  of  "  Madame  1'Etiquette,"  to  the  great  joy  of  the 
young  court  and  of  the  public,  but  to  the  great  scandal  of  some 
old  dowagers  who  would  not  listen  to  reason  on  the  subject  of 
ancient  traditions. 

But  how  was  the  queen,  with  her  lively  and  independent  nature, 
to  submit  to  these  perpetual  restrictions  to  which  she  had  not 
been  accustomed  from  her  youth?  Had  not  her  mother  more 
than  once  urged  her  to  emancipate  herself  from  them,  and  did 
not  her  husband  encourage  a  simplicity  of  manners  toward  which 
his  own  taste  disposed  him?  Everything,  then,  urged  her  to 
shake  off  the  yoke  of  etiquette ;  she  did  so,  perhaps  too  com- 
pletely. Curtailed  of  certain  puerilities,  which  were  but  ridicu- 
lous exaggerations,  this  etiquette  was  requisite  with  a  people 
indiscreet  and  discontented  like  the  French;  the  mystery  with 
which  it  surrounded  the  sovereigns  seemed  to  exalt  them,  and 
served  to  maintain  their  necessary  prestige.  Especially  necessary 
was  it,  a  contemporary  has  remarked,  at  the  very  time  when  it 
was  given  up.  The  unfortunate  Louis  XVI.  recognized  this  later 
in  an  hour  sadly  solemn,  a  few  days  previous  to  mounting  the 
scaffold,  in  one  of  those  interviews  with  his  defenders  wherein 
he  loved  to  recall  the  happier  past. 

"  To  live  in  the  society  of  the  favourite,"  he  said,  "  was  derogatory  to 
the  dauphiness.  Forced  to  withdraw  into  a  sort  of  retirement,  she  adopted 
a  way  of  life  free  from  etiquette  and  restraint ;  she  brought  the  habit  of 
this  to  the  throne.  These  manners,  new  to  the  court,  were  too  much  in 
accord  with  my  natural  tastes  for  me  to  wish  to  oppose  them.  I  knew 
not  then  how  dangerous  it  is  for  sovereigns  to  be  seen  from  too  near. 


THE    KING'S    INOCULATION.  Ill 

Familiarity  destroys  respect,  with  which  it  is  necessary  for  those  who  gov- 
ern to  be  surrounded.  At  first  the  public  applauded  the  abandonment 
of  those  old  customs ;  then  it  looked  upon  it  as  a  crime." 

A  few  first  murmurs,  precursors  of  so  many  others,  made  them- 
selves heard  when  the  king  and  his  brothers  were  inoculated. 
It  was  the  prince  himself  who  had  desired  it,  but  it  was  an  inno- 
vation ;  the  public  attributed  the  idea  of  it  to  the  queen,  and  were 
angry  with  her  for  it.  Inoculation,  though  customary  in  the 
North,  was  but  little  known  then  in  France,  and  did  not  inspire 
confidence ;  it  was  thought  very  imprudent  for  the  entire  royal 
family  to  undergo  an  experiment  of  which  time  had  not  yet 
proved  the  efficacy  beyond  doubt.  It  was  asserted  that  the 
warm  season  was  unfavourable ;  and  every  one  remembered  that 
small-pox  had  always  been  fatal  to  the  Bourbons. 

Maria  Theresa  herself  expressed  an  echo  of  these  complaints 
and  apprehensions  to  her  daughter.  Fortunately  nothing  hap- 
pened to  justify  the  general  uneasiness.  Inoculated  on  Satur- 
day, June  1 8,  the  king  made  no  change  in  his  way  of  living; 
the  eruption  took  place  under  the  best  conditions ;  at  the  end 
of  two  days  the  fever  passed,  and  on  July  I,  Louis  XVI.  could 
write  gayly  to  his  mother-in-law,  — 

"I  assure  you,  together  with  my  wife,  my  dear  mamma,  that  I  am  quite 
recovered  from  my  inoculation  and  that  I  have  suffered  but  very  little. 
I  should  ask  permission  to  embrace  you  if  my  face  were  in  better  con- 
dition." 


CHAPTER   X. 

THE  NEW  MINISTRY.  —  Du  MUY.  —  TURGOT.  —  VERGENNES.  —  RECALL 
OF  THE  PARLIAMENT.  —  MARIE  ANTOINETTE,  QUEEN  OF  FASHION 
AND  TASTE.  —  MADEMOISELLE  BERTIN.  —  THE  COIFFURE.  —  AMUSE- 
MENTS AT  COURT.  —  THE  ENTHUSIASM  OF  HORACE  WALPOLE.  — 
MODERATION  OF  THE  QUEEN  IN  HER  TASTES;  HER  POPULARITY. 
—  REPRESENTATIONS  OF  CLUCK'S  "  IPHIGENIA." —  COODNESS  OF  THE 
QUEEN.  —  MESSIEURS  D'ASSAS,  DE  BELLEGARDE,  DE  CASTELNAU,  DE 
PONTECOULANT. —  DISAGREEMENTS  IN  THE  ROYAL  FAMILY. — FlRST 
CALUMNIES.  —  BEAUMARCHAIS  AND  THE  JEW,  ANGELUCCI.  —  JOURNEY 
OF  THE  ARCHDUKE  MAXIMILIAN.  —  QUESTIONS  OF  PRECEDENCE.— 
MISTAKES  OF  THE  ARCHDUKE.  —  THE  NICKNAME  OF  THE  "AUSTRIAN." 
• — MARIE  ANTOINETTE  NO  LONGER  KNOWS  GERMAN. 

HIS  inoculation  had  not  distracted  Louis  XVI.  from  the  cares 
of  government.  It  was  with  great  difficulty  that,  even  dur- 
ing the  days  of  fever,  his  wife  had  been  able  to  persuade  him  not 
to  hold  the  council,  and  to  abstain  from  work;  but  so  soon  as  the 
success  of  the  operation  was  assured,  he  resumed  his  laborious 
habits.  Desirous  of  completing  his  education,  he  studied  with 
perseverance,  and  especially  the  history  of  France,  meditating 
upon  the  laws  and  customs  of  the  kingdom,  comparing  the  course 
of  different  reigns,  shutting  himself  up  sometimes  to  run  through, 
in  the  silence  of  his  work-room,  the  papers  which  his  father  had 
left  him  on  divers  subjects  pertaining  to  the  government,  reading 
the  best  books  that  appeared  on  administration  and  politics,  and 
annotating  them  with  his  own  hand.  He  never  lost  a  moment; 
his  rising  and  toilet  did  not  last  an  instant ;  every  morning  he 
worked  for  three  or  four  hours;  and  in  the  evening,  on  his  return 
from  the  hunt,  which  continued  to  be  one  of  his  favourite  amuse- 
ments, he  again  passed  a  certain  time  at  his  desk,  or  in  discourse 
with  his  ministers,  often  retaining  their  portfolios  and  not  sending 
them  back  until  the  following  day,  with  his  observations. 

The  ministry  had  finally  been  formed.  On  the  5th  of  June, 
the  Marechal  du  Muy  and  the  Comte  de  Vergennes  succeeded  to 
the  Due  d'Aiguillon,  the  former  as  minister  of  war,  the  second  as 


DU   MUY,   TURGOT,   AND   VERGENNES.  113 

minister  of  foreign  affairs.  On  July  14,  Turgot  replaced  De 
Boynes  in  the  marine.  On  August  24,  Maupeou  and  Terray 
were  dismissed.  Hue  de  Miromesnil,  former  president  of  the 
Parliament  of  Rouen,  received  the  seals  ;  Turgot  took  the  general 
control  and  left  the  marine  to  Sartines.  Of  all  the  old  cabinet 
there  remained  but  the  Due  de  la  Vrilliere,  who  was  saved  from 
the  general  overthrow  by  the  protection  of  his  nephew,  Maure 
pas.  "  Here  is  a  fine  St.  Bartholomew  of  ministers,"  some  one 
remarked  on  learning  the  wished-for  fall  of  Maupeou  and  Terray. 
"  Yes,"  replied  the  ambassador  from  Spain,  the  Count  of  Aranda, 
"  but  it  is  not  a  massacre  of  the  Innocents." 

On  the  following  day,  when  the  women  of  the  halles  came 
according  to  custom  to  felicitate  the  king  on  the  occasion  of  the 
festival  of  Saint  Louis,  they  said,  alluding  to  his  well-known  love 
of  the  hunt,  "  Sire,  we  have  come  to  compliment  your  Majesty 
on  yesterday's  chase ;  your  grandfather  never  made  so  good 
a  one." 

The  new  appointments  gave  satisfaction  to  the  public ;  they 
were  both  a  reparation  and  a  promise.  The  Marechal  du  Muy 
had  been  the  most  intimate  friend  of  the  dauphin,  father  of  the 
king;  after  the  fall  of  Choiseul  he  had  refused  the  portfolio  of 
war  in  order  not  to  bend  the  knee  to  Madame  du  Barry.  Sar- 
tines had  made  a  name  for  himself  as  lieutenant  of  police;  and 
although  this  office  did  not  seem  to  fit  him  specially  for  the  new 
post  confided  to  him,  he  was  able  by  his  intelligence  and  activity 
to  impart  an  impetus  to  the  French  marine  whose  effects  were 
felt  in  the  American  war.  Turgot  had  an  undoubted  reputation 
among  economists.  While  intendant  of  Limousin  he  had  made 
very  important  reforms,  and  it  is  related  that  when  he  left  that 
province,  where  he  had  made  himself  so  beloved,  the  cures  an- 
nounced publicly  that  they  should  say  mass  for  him,  and  the 
peasants  left  their  work  to  assist  at  the  mass.  "  He  is  an  honest 
and  enlightened  man ;  that  is  sufficient  for  me,"  the  king  had 
said  when  he  had  been  proposed  to  him.  An  honest  man,  that 
was  the  epithet  which  every  one  attached  to  the  name  of  Turgot. 
"  Every  one  acknowledges  that  he  is  upright  and  honest,"  Mercy 
wrote  to  the  Baron  de  Neny.  "  He  has  the  reputation  of  being 
an  honest  man,"  the  queen  on  her  side  wrote. 

The  Comte  de  Vergennes  had  been  ambassador  to  Constanti- 
nople, then  to  Sweden,  during  the  recent  coup  d'ttal  of  Gustavus 
III.     He  was  a  diplomat  of  the  old  school,  a  gourmet  perhaps, 
VOL.  i.  — 8 


114  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

but  a  hard  worker  who  had  borne  himself  with  distinction  in  the 
missions  which  he  had  fulfilled;  of  a  moderate  disposition,  more- 
over, an  enemy  to  bold  ventures,  such,  in  a  word,  as  suited  a 
timorous  prince  like  Louis  XVI.  Although  he  had  been  greatly 
prejudiced  against  the  Austrian  alliance,  the  queen  treated  him 
with  great  amiability  and  undertook,  in  a  matter  which  touched 
him  very  closely,  since  it  concerned  his  wife,  to  smooth  the  diffi- 
culties relative  to  the  presentation  of  the  Comtesse  de  Vergennes. 

A  serious  affair  of  a  different  nature  obtruded  itself  in  the 
deliberations  of  the  minister,  and  claimed  the  decision  of  Louis 
XVI.  Should  the  Parliament,  exiled  by  Louis  XV.,  be  recalled 
and  re-established,  or  should  they  maintain  a  reform  which  had 
been  violently  accomplished,  no  doubt,  but  which  from  certain 
points  of  view  —  those  of  politics  and  justice  —  offered  certain  very 
real  advantages?  Considering  the  desire  which  Louis  XVI.  felt 
to  gain  the  affection  of  his  people,  the  care  which  Maurepas  took 
to  calm  public  impatience,  and  the  discredit  which  the  pam- 
phlets of  Beaumarchais  had  thrown  upon  the  new  Parliament,  and 
the  open  demand  of  public  opinion,  the  hesitation  of  the  king 
and  his  minister  could  not  be  long.  The  disgrace  of  Maupeou 
was,  and  was  bound  to  be,  the  signal  for  the  recall  of  the  Parlia- 
ment. Despite  Vergennes  and  Turgot,  they  were  re-established 
at  the  bed  of  justice  held  on  the  I2th  of  November,  1774,  with 
certain  restrictions  which  seemed  good,  but  which  were  only  irri- 
tating. To  the  eyes  of  many  clear-sighted  persons,  this  was  a 
mistake,  and  Maria  Theresa's  good  sense  was  not  mistaken.  "  It 
is  incomprehensible,"  she  said,  "  that  the  king  and  his  ministers 
should  destroy  the  work  of  Maupeou."  It  seemed  to  him  pos- 
sible to  recall  the  members  without  reconstituting  the  body,  to 
establish  order  in  the  administration  of  justice  without  building 
up  a  political  authority  which  had  so  often  undermined  the  royal 
authority.  The  Parliament,  intoxicated  by  the  popularity  which 
greeted  their  return,  were  not  long  in  resuming  their  old  tricks, 
and  their  systematic  opposition  was  one  of  the  principal  obstacles 
which  rendered  ineffective  the  wise  reforms  of  Turgot  and  the 
generous  intentions  of  Louis  XVI. 

As  for  the  queen,  while  not  desiring  to  meddle  in  any  way,  she 
could  not  resist  the  noise  of  applause,  and  the  happiness  of 
making  others  happy.  "  I  have  great  joy,"  she  wrote,  "  in  think- 
ing that  there  is  no  one  in  exile  or  misfortune."  On  the  day  fol- 
lowing this  remark,  indeed,  the  princes  of  the  blood  were  to  reap- 


SHE    IS    QUEEN    OF    FASHION.  115 

pear  at  the  chateau,  the  royal  mourning  was  to  come  to  an  end, 
and  the  queen,  for  the  future  assured  of  the  brilliancy  of  the 
court,  busied  herself  with  trying  to  make  it  even  more  resplendent. 
Louis  XVI.,  inexpert  in  all  matters  of  amusement,  left  to  his  wife 
the  responsibility  of  organizing  the  entertainments  for  the  win- 
ter; it  was  the  department  which  he  abandoned  to  her  adminis- 
tration, and  Marie  Antoinette  accepted  it  with  pleasure.  Leaving 
to  the  monarch  and  his  ministers  all  business  affairs,  she  limited 
her  efforts  to  governing  the  court;  it  was  the  only  empire  for 
which  she  felt  any  ambition.  She  ruled  it  with  ease,  and  her 
decrees  were  royal ;  she  was  the  queen  of  taste,  and  she  wielded 
the  sceptre  with  a  brilliancy  and  certainty  which  allowed  of  no 
rivalry. 

The  women  of  the  court,  while  not  possessing  her  beauty,  wished 
none  the  less  to  appear  in  the  same  garb.  Whatever  the  young 
princess  adopted  became  the  fashion ;  from  the  moment  that  she 
affected  a  colour  no  one  would  wear  any  other.  One  day  she 
chose  a  dress  of  dark-brown  taffeta.  "  It  is  puce-coloured,"  said 
the  king;  and  the  dyers  busied  themselves  only  with  making 
puce-coloured  stuffs  of  various  shades,  —  old  puce,  young  puce, 
stomach,  back,  head,  and  thigh  of  puce.  Another  time  the  queen 
wore  a  satin  of  a  delicate  ash-gray.  "  The  colour  of  the  hair  of 
the  queen ! "  Monsieur  cried  gallantly ;  and  immediately  the 
entire  court  clothed  itself  to  match ;  and  one  sent  locks  of  the 
amiable  sovereign's  hair  to  Lyons  and  to  the  Gobelins  in  order 
that  the  exact  shade  might  be  copied.  Fashion  entered  the 
field,  and,  as  always  in  France,  exaggerated  fashion,  above  all, 
when  Mademoiselle  Bertin,  whom  the  Duchesse  de  Chartres  had 
recommended  to  the  queen,  became  the  dictator  of  it;  she  be- 
came intoxicated  by  the  patronage  of  her  august  client,  fancied 
herself  a  minister,  and  even  forgot  herself  so  far  one  day  as  to 
say  to  a  lady  who  came  to  consult  her,  "  Show  Madame  the  pat- 
terns of  my  last  work  for  her  Majesty."  It  was  she  who  developed, 
in  a  few  years,  in  Marie  Antoinette  a  love  of  dress,  though  her 
taste  had  formerly  been  very  moderate,  and  later  was  to  grow 
simple  again  beneath  the  shades  of  Trianon. 

With  the  modiste,  there  was  the  designer  of  costumes,  Boc- 
quet,  whose  sketches  the  dressmaker  carried  out  for  the  court 
balls ;  by  the  side  of  Mademoiselle  Bertin  and  Bocquet  was  the 
hair-dresser,  Leonard.  He  was  not  the  hair-dresser  in  title;  the 
hair-dresser  in  title  was  called  Larseneur ;  but  the  latter  had  neither 


Il6  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

taste  nor  delicacy,  and  as  soon  as  he  was  gone,  Marie  Antoinette, 
who  out  of  goodness  of  heart  did  not  wish  to  dismiss  him,  called 
Leonard  and  had  him  undo  the  edifice  which  had  been  so  awk- 
wardly constructed.  With  such  noble  patronage,  Leonard  soon 
became  the  fashion ;  but  he,  at  least,  paid  his  debt  of  gratitude 
by  a  devotion  without  bounds,  and  a  fidelity  which  misfortune 
could  not  alter. 

Under  his  influence  and  that  of  Mademoiselle  Bertin,  the  head- 
dresses attained  colossal  proportions.  There  was  a  whole  scaf- 
folding of  gauze,  of  flowers  and  feathers,  —  of  feathers  especially, 
interwoven  with  the  hair,  which  was  crimped,  curled,  braided, 
frizzed ;  a  veritable  chef  cTceuvre  of  imagination  and  patience. 
A  whole  landscape  was  worn  upon  the  head,  a  mountain,  a 
meadow  studded  with  flowers,  a  brook,  an  English  garden,  a  ves- 
sel on  the  rough  sea,  etc.  The  designs  and  the  names  for  them 
varied  to  infinity,  from  the  aigrette,  which  took  its  name  of 
quesaco  from  the  Memoirs  of  Beaumarchais,  to  the  coiffure  a 
I' inoculation  and  au  lever  de  la  reine,  to  the  coiffure  au  c/iicn 
coucliant,  or  a  I  kerisson,  a  la  baignenss,  an  bandeau  dc  I  amour, 
a  la  frivolite',  a  la  belle  poule,  not  to  forget  the  bonnets  au  Colisce 
or  a  la  candeur,  the  hats  a  ranglaise  or  a  la  Henri  IV,,  the  toques 
a  I'espagnolette ;  nor  must  we  forget  above  all  the  puff  au  senti- 
ment, in  which  the  Uuchesse  de  Chartres  succeeded  in  picturing 
her  son,  the  Due  de  Valois,  in  the  arms  of  his  nurse,  with  a  little 
negro  page  and  a  parrot  pecking  at  cherries.  The  dimensions 
grew  to  be  prodigious,  so  that  the  head  of  a  woman,  it  is  said, 
attained  the  height  of  seventy-two  inches,  and  it  became  neces- 
sary to  increase  the  height  of  the  doors  in  order  to  allow  ladies 
in  full  dress  to  pass  through. 

The  rumours  of  these  extravagances  even  reached  Vienna, 
with  comments  and  exaggerations,  of  course,  and  Maria  Theresa 
became  alarmed  for  her  daughter :  — 

"  I  cannot  help  touching  upon  a  point  which  many  of  the  papers  dwell 
upon  but  too  often.  This  is  the  coiffure  which  you  have  adopted,  *  They 
say  that  from  the  roots  of  the  hair  it  rises  thirty-six  inches,  and  that  feathers 
and  ribbons  are  on  top  of  this !  You  know  that  I  have  always  thought 
that  we  should  follow  the  fashion  with  moderation,  and  should  never  ex- 
aggerate. A  young  and  pretty  queen  with  many  charms  has  no  need  of 
such  folly ;  on  the  contrary,  the  simplicity  of  her  adornment  will  make  her 
seem  but  the  more  beautiful,  and  is  better  suited  to  the  rank  of  a  queen. 
It  is  she  who  should  set  the  fashion,  and  every  one  will  hasten  to  follow 


COURT   AMUSEMENTS.  117 

even  her  trivial  changes ;  but  I,  who  love  and  follow  my  little  queen  at 
every  step,  —  I  cannot  forbear  warning  her  against  this  petty  frivolity, 
though  I  have,  on  the  other  hand,  so  many  reasons  to  be  satisfied  and 
even  to  be  proud  of  what  you  are  doing." 

And  the  queen  immediately  replied,  "  It  is  true  that  I  busy 
myself  with  my  adornment ;  as  for  the  feathers,  every  one  wears 
them,  and  it  would  seem  extraordinary  not  to  do  so." 

Whatever  the  gazettes  may  have  said,  and  Maria  Theresa 
thought,  the  truth  is  that  Marie  Antoinette  but  followed  the 
fashion,  and  had  even  tried  at  times  to  moderate  it.  Indeed,  the 
public  was  not  so  scandalized  as  some  of  the  chroniclers  would 
make  out,  and  in  a  collection  of  head-dresses  published  a  little 
later,  these  rhymes  were  printed  beneath  a  pretty  engraving  of 
the  queen  in  her  morning  dress :  — 

"  Behold  the  coiffure  of  our  queen, 
Whose  perfect  taste  is  therein  seen. 
'T  were  well  her  style  to  imitate, 
Herself  in  acts  both  small  and  great. 
For  should  you  copy  her  good  deeds, 
You  will  inspire  our  love,  respect, 
And  like  her,  sow  the  seeds 
Of  charity  towards  God's  elect." 

Whether  at  Versailles  or  at  Fontainebleau,  the  success  of  the 
young  sovereign  was  brilliant.  The  apartment  in  which  she  held 
her  play,  however  vast  it  might  be,  was  always  full ;  at  play  as  at 
the  suppers,  whose  establishment  we  have  described  above,  the 
queen  wished  that  evAy  one  should  be  content  with  the  recep- 
tion he  met  with,  and  she  succeeded  admirably.  "  In  this  re- 
spect her  Majesty  has  reached  perfection,"  the  scrupulous  Mercy- 
wrote.  On  Jan.  I,  1775,  a  large  number  of  people,  ministers,  the 
chief  officials,  and  more  than  two  hundred  ladies  betook  them- 
selves to  Versailles  to  pay  their  court,  and  each  one  departed 
filled  with  respect  and  gratitude.  During  the  following  winter 
there  were  representations'  at  Versailles  three  times  a  week,  two 
in  French  and  one  in  Italian ;  every  Monday  there  was  a  ball 
with  quadrilles  in  costume  and  contre-danses.  These  offered  but 
fresh  opportunities  for  the  charming  princess  to  display  her 
grace :  strangers  or  Frenchmen,  all  alike  fell  under  her  charm ; 
it  was  exaltation,  infatuation. 

"  No  one  had  eyes  for  any  one  save  the  queen,"  Wai  pole  wrote  in  the 
month  of  August,  1 775,  at  the  marriage  festivities  of  Madame  Clotilde.  "  All 


Il8  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  Hebes,  Floras,  Helens,  Graces,  are  but  street-walkers  by  the  side  of 
her.  Whether  she  is  standing  or  sitting,  she  is  the  image  of  beauty  ;  when 
she  moves,  it  is  grace  personified.  She  wore  a  dress  of  silver  strewn  with 
laurel-rose,  few  diamonds  or  feathers.  They  say  that  she  does  not  dance 
in  time,  but  then  it  is  the  time  that  is  wrong.  .  .  In  the  matter  of  beauties 
I  saw  not  one,  or  else  the  queen  effaced  them  all." 

Three  years  later  the  ambassador  from  Morocco,  assisting  at 
one  of  these  court  balls,  and  asked  by  the  Comte  d'Artois  who 
among  the  ladies  present  seemed  to  him  the  most  beautiful,  the 
queen  excepted,  replied  gallantly  that  the  restriction  imposed  by 
the  prince  made  it  impossible  for  him  to  answer,  which  response 
was  very  well  turned  for  a  barbarian. 

What  was  even  more  surprising  was  that  these  fetes  entailed 
but  a  very  moderate  expenditure.  Turgot  himself  found  nothing 
to  say  against  them.  The  queen  had  desired  that  the  balls  should 
take  place  in  her  own  apartment,  which  gave  them  a  semi-private 
character,  and  thus  avoided  the  expenses  which  more  ceremonial 
balls  would  have  necessitated.  She  had  also  given  up  having  the 
opera  brought  to  Versailles,  and  decided  that  when  she  wished  to 
hear  it,  she  would  go  to  Paris.  This  was  at  the  time  when  the 
comptroller-general,  faithful  to  his  celebrated  programme,  —  no 
bankruptcy,  no  increase  of  taxation,  no  loans,  —  was  beginning  his 
economical  reforms.  The  queen  lent  herself  to  them  with  the 
greatest  good-will,  and  she  did  not  hesitate  to  give  up  any  amuse- 
ments that  she  feared  might  become  expensive  or  embarrassing. 
If  later  she  allowed  herself  to  be  led  into  certain  prodigalities,  it 
is  the  more  important  to  note  that  at  the  beginning  of  her  reign 
such  prodigalities  were  neither  in  accord  with  her  principles  nor 
her  tastes. 

The  public  knew  this ;  it  saw  with  satisfaction  their  sovereigns 
setting  the  first  example  of  economy  in  their  expenditures  and 
restraint  in  their  pleasures.  It  knew  also  that  the  young  princess 
was  opposed  to  the  renewal  of  the  monopoly  in  the  commerce  of 
bread-stuffs,  which  had  been  established  by  the  Abbe  Terray,  and 
which  the  public  had  damned  with  the  name  of  the  Famine  Com- 
pact. It  adored  her,  and  Mercy  could  say  with  truth  that  if  the 
authors  of  the  libels  which  were  beginning  to  appear  became 
known  in  Paris,  nothing  could  save  them  from  the  anger  of  the 
people.  "  Let  us  avenge  our  charming  queen,  of  whom  this 
wretch  has  dared  to  speak  evil  and  write  libels,"  they  had  cried, 
on  burning  the  effigy  of  the  Chancellor  Maupeou. 


HER    GOODNESS.  1 19 


Every  appearance  of  Marie  Antoinette  in  the  capital  was  a 
veritable  triumph;  and  when  on  Wednesday,  Jan.  13,  1775,  she 
went  without  equipage  to  the  opera  to  assist  at  a  performance  of 
Gluck's  "  Iphigenia,"  the  people  gathered  in  crowds  along  her 
route  and  applauded  with  enthusiasm.  In  the  second  act  of  the 
piece  the  actor  who  played  the  r61e  of  Achilles,  instead  of  reciting 
exactly  the  line, 

"  Sing,  celebrate  your  queen," 

advanced  toward  the  footlights  and  boxes  and  sang, 

"  Oh,  let  us  sing  and  celebrate  our  queen ! 
For  Hymen  holds  her  'neath  his  laws  enchained, 
And  soon  will  make  us  happy  evermore." 

The  entire  audience  joined  in  the  delicate  homage ;  there  were 
innumerable  plaudits  and  acclamations  ;  the  chorus  was  repeated ; 
and  the  cries  of  "  Long  live  the  queen  !  "  were  so  noisy  that  the 
performance  was  interrupted  for  more  than  a  quarter  of  an  hour. 
Monsieur,  Madame,  and  the  Comte  d'Artois,  who  were  in  the 
royal  box,  were  the  first  to  applaud.  The  queen  was  so  touched 
by  these  striking  indications  of  sympathy  that  she  could  not  re- 
strain her  tears;  and  when  she  went  out,  her  eyes  still  shining 
and  wet  with  tears,  she  saluted  the  people  with  an  air  so  full  of 
emotion,  and  an  affability  so  moving,  that  the  cries  of  joy  were 
redoubled. 

Marie  Antoinette  reigned  not  only  by  her  grace,  but  by  her 
goodness.  She  sent  relief  to  the  poor,  to  the  wounded,  to  the 
victims  of  fires.  She  heard  that  the  family  of  the  Chevalier 
d'Assas,  notwithstanding  the  historical  devotion  of  the  captain  to 
the  regiment  of  Auvergne,  was  living  in  the  country  in  oblivion 
and  obscurity.  She  immediately  called  the  brother  of  the  hero 
to  the  court  and  had  a  company  of  cavalry  given  to  him.  She 
obtained  a  new  hearing  of  the  case  of  Messieurs  de  Bellegarde 
and  de  Moustiers,  who  had  been  pursued  by  the  spite  of  the  Due 
d'Aiguillon;  and  when  their  innocence  had  been  established,  and 
the  two  prisoners,  set  at  liberty,  came  with  their  wives  and  children 
to  thank  their  benefactress,  she  replied  modestly  that  justice 
alone  had  been  done,  and  that  one  should  congratulate  her  only 
on  the  greatest  happiness  arising  from  her  position, — that  of  being 
able  to  lay  before  the  king  just  claims.  As  a  token  of  gratitude 
Madame  de  Bellegarde  had  a  picture  painted  in  which  she  was 
represented  with  her  husband  kneeling  before  the  queen  and  car- 


120  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

rying  in  her  arms  her  child,  from  whose  head  the  princess  turned 
aside  a  suspended  blade.  The  queen  was  greatly  touched,  and 
placed  the  picture  in  her  apartment.  In  the  same  way  she  pro- 
tected Lally  Tolendal,  called  him  her  little  martyr,  and  aided  him 
in  his  efforts  to  rehabilitate  his  father. 

The  Marquis  de  Pontecoulant,  major-general  of  the  life  guards, 
had,  we  know  not  how,  displeased  the  dauphiness  during  the  life- 
time of  Louis  XV.  The  young. princess,  greatly  incensed  against 
him,  had  even  declared  that  she  should  never  forget  his  conduct. 
When  Louis  XVI.  ascended  the  throne,  Monsieur  de  Pontecoulant, 
remembering  that  he  had  incurred  the  displeasure  of  the  new  sov- 
ereign, placed  his  resignation  in  the  hands  of  the  Prince  de  Beau- 
vau,  captain  of  the  guards.  Marie  Antoinette  heard  of  it.  "The 
queen,"  she  said,  "  does  not  remember  the  quarrels  of  the  dau- 
phiness, and  it  is  I  who  beg  Monsieur  de  Pontecoulant  to  think 
no  longer  of  what  I  have  forgotten."  After  so  gracious  an  insist- 
ence his  resignation  was  withdrawn. 

Finally,  a  councillor  of  the  Parliament,  Monsieur  de  Castelnau, 
from  Bordeaux,  who  had  fallen  madly  in  love  with  Marie  Antoi- 
nette, and  pursued  her  everywhere  with  his  declarations  and  im- 
portunities, was  sentenced  to  imprisonment;  the  queen,  though 
greatly  incensed  at  the  unfortunate  man,  intervened.  "  Let  him 
annoy  me,"  she  said,  "  but  do  not  let  him  be  deprived  of  the  hap- 
piness of  being  at  liberty." 

She  had  other  enemies.  On  the  day  following  her  accession, 
and  in  her  own  family,  she  encountered  opposition  and  jealousy. 
The  Comte  and  Comtesse  de  Provence,  the  Comte  and  Comtesse 
d'Artois,  instigated  in  secret  by  Mesdames,  refused  to  go  each 
morning  to  pay  their  court  to  the  king  and  queen  as  etiquette 
required.  Louis  XVI.,  with  his  excessive  good-nature,  did  not 
wish  that  his  brothers  should  address  him  as  "  your  Majesty;  " 
Marie  Antoinette,  always  kind  too,  often  too  kind,  allowed  the 
same  simplicity  in  her  relations  with  her  brothers-in-law  and 
sisters-in-law.  Maria  Theresa  was  uneasy  at  this,  and  with  her 
German  roughness  reprimanded  her  daughter  for  this  condescen- 
sion. "  You  must  keep  your  place,"  she  wrote  her,  "  and  know 
how  to  play  your  part;  in  that  manner  you  will  put  yourself 
and  every  one  else  at  ease.  Every  condescension  and  consid- 
eration to  every  one,  but  no  familiarity,  no  gossip.  You  will 
thus  avoid  annoyances."  The  fears  of  the  empress  were  soon 
realized.  On  public  occasions,  when  the  royal  family  were  as- 


FIRST    CALUMNIES.  121 

sembled,  there  was  such  an  appearance  of  equality  among  the 
three  princes  that  a  stranger  could  not  have  distinguished  the 
king  from  his  brothers.  The  Comte  d'Artois  especially,  who  was 
always  petulant,  affected  a  shocking  familiarity.  The  Comte  de 
Provence,  who  was  more  diplomatic,  did  not  make  himself  so 
conspicuous,  but  worked  in  secret.  More  ambitious  than  ever  on 
seeing  at  the  end  of  four  years  no  heir  presumptive  to  the  throne 
appear,  he  aspired  to  enter  the  council  of  State,  where  he  counted 
on  playing  an  important  part,  and  he  blamed  the  queen  for  the 
defeat  of  his  pretensions.  Madame  Adelaide,  always  bitter  and 
envious,  had  not  forgiven  her  niece  for  the  diminution  of  her  in- 
fluence. Maurepas  and  his  wife,  jealous  of  a  power  which  threat- 
ened them,  allied  themselves  to  their  nephew,  D'Aiguillon,  who 
was  still  smarting  from  his  fall,  and  who  used  his  knowledge  of 
the  court  and  the  connections  he  had  kept  there  to  further  his 
personal  spite.  Hence  arose  underhand  manoeuvres,  injurious 
songs,  and  cynical  verses ;  it  would  seem  as  though  the  hidden 
object  of  the  enemies  of  the  queen  was  to  ruin  her  in  public 
estimation  and  in  the  affection  of  her  husband,  to  the  end,  per- 
haps, of  having  the  young  woman*  whose  beauty  provoked 
comparison  and  whose  virtue  seemed  a  rebuke,  sent  back  to 
Germany. 

When  the  ladies  of  the  court  made  their  courtesies  of  mourn- 
ing after  the  death  of  Louis  XV.,  the  queen  allowed  herself  to 
smile,  not  at  the  antiquated  costume  of  certain  venerable  dowa- 
gers, but  at  a  witticism  made  at  their  expense  by  the  Marquis  de 
Clermont-Tonnerre.  Immediately  the  makers  of  couplets  set 
themselves  to  work;  and  on  the  following  day  the  echoes  of 
Versailles  repeated  this  insulting  refrain,  which  but  too  plainly 
betrayed  the  secret  intentions  of  the  conspirators :  — 

"  Little  queen  of  twenty, 
You  who  treat  us  badly, 
You  shall  cross  again  the  barrier, 
LaSre,  laire,  Ian  laire." 

When,  after  the  inoculation  of  the  king  and  his  brothers,  the 
court  for  the  first  time  was  transferred  to  Marly,  Marie  Antoi- 
nette, wishing  to  enjoy  the  pure  air  of  a  beautiful  summer  night, 
expressed  a  desire  to  see  the  sun  rise.  She  spoke  to  her  hus- 
band of  it;  the  king  consented  willingly,  but  being  accustomed  to 
going  to  bed  at  a  fixed  hour,  did  not  care  to  sacrifice  his  sleep 


122  LIFE   OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

for  any  such  spectacle.  The  queen  betook  herself  at  three 
o'clock  in  the  morning  to  a  high  point  in  the  garden  of  Marly. 
A  large  number  of  people  followed  her,  and  her  women  accom- 
panied her.  But  her  customary  defamers  took  care  not  to  miss 
so  good  an  opportunity,  and  some  days  later  a  little  pamphlet, 
"  flat,  obscure,  and  despicable,"  as  an  author  has  said  who  knew, 
and  execrated  by  all  good  Frenchmen,  but  eagerly  sought  for  by 
courtiers  versed  in  scandal  and  women  too  much  at  odds  with 
virtue  to  believe  in  that  of  others,  transformed  this  innocent  fancy 
of  the  young  sovereign  into  an  infamous  orgy. 

Almost  at  the  same  time  there  appeared  in  London  —  that 
refuge  of  hardened  writers  and  anonymous  defamers  —  an  odious 
libel,  the  prelude  and  model  of  so  many  others,  under  rather 
mysterious  circumstances,  which  it  may  not  be  without  interest 
to  recall  here. 

One  of  the  most  brilliant  minds,  but  also  one  of  the  most  un- 
scrupulous characters,  of  that  century  was  a  man  named  Beau- 
marchais,  who  was  ever  ready  to  undertake  doubtful  intrigues, 
or  to  venture  on  disreputable  undertakings,  and  who  had  been 
charged  during  the  last  days  of  Louis  XV.  to  buy  and  to  destroy 
a  brochure  against  Madame  du  Barry.  When  he  returned  to 
Paris,  after  having  succeeded  in  this  delicate  enterprise,  he  found 
Louis  XV.  at  St.  Denys,  and  Louis  XVI.  on  the  throne.  He 
could  hardly  hope  that  the  new  king  would  recompense  him  for 
a  service  rendered  to  the  woman  whom  he  had  just  exiled  to 
Pont-aux-Dames.  Immediately  changing  his  plan  with  that  ver- 
satility the  personification  of  which  he  was  later  to  immortalize 
in  Figaro,  he  offered  his  services  to  suppress  a  new  pamphlet 
which  he  averred  he  had  discovered  in  London,  and  this  time 
against  Marie  Antoinette.  The  lieutenant  of  police,  Sartines, 
accepted  his  offer. 

Beaumarchais  immediately  departed,  and  succeeded  in  obtain- 
ing by  money  from  the  enemy  of  the  queen,  the  Jew,  Angelucci, 
the  edition  published  in  England,  had  it  burned,  also  bought  anil 
destroyed  a  new  edition  published  in  Holland,  and  was  preparing 
to  return  to  Paris  when  he  learned  —  we  are  following  his  ver- 
sion—  that  Angelucci  had  deceived  him  and  had  kept  a  copy  of 
the  pamphlet  He  flew  after  him,  followed  him  across  Germany, 
overtook  him  in  a  wood  near  Nuremberg,  and  after  wanderings, 
perils,  fights  with  robbers,  whose  details  do  more  honour  to  his 
imagination  than  his  veracity,  he  obtained  possession  of  the  copy. 


BEAUMARCHAIS.  123 


Then  instead  of  returning  to  Paris,  he  went  to  Vienna,  where 
he  wished,  so  he  averred,  to  have  an  expurgated  edition  of  the 
libel  published,  as  the  original  text  might  produce  too  painful  an 
impression  on  the  new  king,  but  where  in  reality  he  proposed  to 
exploit  his  service,  true  or  false,  to  the  daughter  of  Maria  Theresa. 
He  pushed  his  audacity  so  far  as  to  be  presented  to  the  empress, 
and  read  her  the  pamphlet ;  but  here  his  awakening  began.  Maria 
Theresa  was  indignant  at  the  calumnies  published  against  the  vir- 
tue of  her  daughter.  She  was  broken-hearted  at  the  indecent  slan- 
der which  went  so  far  as  to  allege  that  the  queen  would  lend  herself 
to  a  criminal  intrigue,  as  the  king  was  not  able  to  have  any  chil- 
dren. But  she  was  not  at  all  grateful  to  Beaumarchais  for  his 
discovery ;  she  looked  upon  him  as  a  miserable  impostor,  and 
the  Prince  von  Kaunitz  even  suspected  him  of  being  the  author 
of  the  libel.  He  was  thrown  into  prison,  then,  on  a  demand  from 
France,  released ;  they  were  even  forced  to  give  him  an  indemnity 
of  a  thousand  ducats,  but  at  the  same  time  signifying  to  that 
'•  rogue,"  as  Kaunitz  called  him,  to  that  "  intriguer,"  as  the  em- 
press said,  to  decamp  as  soon  as  possible.  Beaumarchais  de- 
parted at  once,  but  this  discomfiture  in  no  wise  lessened  his 
audacity;  he  returned  to  Versailles  and  demanded  the  price  of 
this  undertaking.  Whoever  may  have  been  the  author  of  this 
libel, —whether  it  was  Beaumarchais,  as  Kaunitz  believed;  or 
some  friend  of  Madame  de  Marsan,  as  Maria  Theresa  suspected ; 
or  the  Due  d'Aiguillon,  as  Mercy  would  seem  to  insinuate,  —  the 
historian  must  take  notice  of  this  first  and  Machiavelian  tentative 
against  the  reputation  of  the  queen.  It  was  the  beginning  of  that 
tortuous  and  hidden  power  which  had  sworn  to  overthrow  her, 
and  kept  its  word,  and  which  the  goodness  of  Marie  Antoinette 
could  never  disarm. 

The  king,  with  that  openness  which  refused  to  believe  in  the 
baseness  and  wickedness  of  men,  only  laughed  at  what  he  called 
the  escapade  of  the  impudent  fool  Beaumarchais.  But  the  queen 
did  not  take  the  affair  as  tranquilly  as  her  husband ;  she  was  pro- 
foundly hurt  by  the  attack  on  her  reputation.  But,  strong  in  the 
testimony  of  her  conscience  and  in  the  purity  of  her  life  and 
intentions,  she  soon  forgot  the  mysterious  episode,  and  with  a 
goodness  which  was  imprudent,  even  became  the  protectress  of 
the  man  who  had  been  so  actively  and  in  so  cowardly  a  manner 
involved  in  the  miserable  intrigue. 

An   instance  better  known,  and  a  more  patent  grievance,  was 


J24  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

soon  to  give  a  motive,  or  at  least  a  more  special  pretext,  to  the 
complaints  of  her  enemies  at  court,  where  everything  was  a  sub- 
ject of  vexation.  For  some  time  there  had  been  a  question  of 
the  brothers  of  the  queen  making  a  journey  to  France ;  first 
Joseph  II.  had  had  the  idea,  then  the  youngest  son  of  the  em- 
press, Maximilian.  The  latter  was  then,  under  the  direction 
of  the  Count  von  Rosenberg,  visiting  Germany  and  the  Low 
Countries  to  complete  his  education. 

He  was  a  prince  eighteen  years  of  age,  of  a  genuine  goodness 
of  disposition,  but  with  awkward  manners,  limited  intelligence, 
and  little  education.  Maria  Theresa  recognized  this  herself, 
when  she  recommended  him  to  make  strenuous  efforts  to  acquire 
that  amiability  and  easy  politeness  in  the  world,  which,  she  said, 
"you  entirely  lack."  "  He  will  not  shine  after  his  brother,"  she 
wrote  at  a  time  when  the  coming  of  Joseph  II.  was  to  have 
preceded  that  of  Maximilian. 

But  the  queen,  who  had  seen  none  of  her  family  for  four  years, 
could  not  know  that  her  brother  was  so  near  her  without  wishing 
to  see  him  in  France ;  the  king  seconded  the  invitation  of  his 
wife,  and  the  journey  was  determined  upon. 

On  Tuesday,  Feb.  7,  1775,  the  Archduke  Maximilian  arrived 
at  La  Muette,  where  his  sister  awaited  him.  The  reception  of  the 
royal  family  was  cordial.  The  king  desired  that  every  effort 
should  be  made  to  amuse  his  young  brother-in-law,  and  the  queen 
had  undertaken  to  see  to  it.  With  the  authority  which  the  differ- 
ence in  their  station  gave  her,  she  treated  her  brother  as  her 
child;  she  was  anxious  that  he  should  carry  away  a  good  impres- 
sion of  France,  and  make  a  good  impression  himself.  Unfor- 
tunately it  chanced  otherwise. 

In  order  to  avoid  all  dispute  on  the  subject  of  precedence  and 
etiquette,  the  archduke  travelled  under  the  name  of  the  Comte  de 
Bargau  ;  but  this  very  precaution  became  the  source  of  a  thou- 
sand annoyances.  On  the  pretext  of  the  incognito  of  Maximilian, 
the  princes  of  the  houses  of  Orleans,  Conde,  Conti,  claimed  that 
he  should  visit  them  first;  the  archduke  refused.  The  queen 
took  the  part  of  her  brother  with  warmth,  and  had  a  very  lively 
interview  with  the  Due  d'Orleans.  "  The  king  and  his  brothers," 
she  said  to  him,  "  have  not  been  so  fastidious.  Setting  aside  the 
rank  of  the  archduke,  you  should  have  seen  that  the  king  treated 
him  as  a  brother,  and  that  he  has  had  him  to  sup  in  private  with 
the  royal  family,  —  an  honour  to  which  I  presume  you  would  never 


MISTAKES    OF   ARCHDUKE    MAXIMILIAN.  125 

have  aspired.  My  brother  will  be  sorry  not  to  see  the  princes, 
but  he  is  at  Paris  for  only  a  short  time,  and  has  many  things  to 
see ;  he  can  dispense  with  it." 

In  order  to  efface  this  disagreeable  impression,  the  queen  re- 
doubled her  attentions  to  Maximilian  ;  and  some  young  people  of 
the  highest  fashion  —  the  Segurs,  the  Durforts,  the  La  Marcks 
—  united  to  give  a  magnificent  entertainment  to  the  archduke  in 
the  stables  of  the  king.  With  kindly  tact  the  Comte  de  Provence 
and  the  Comte  d'Artois  wished  to  put  themselves  at  the  head 
of  the  organizers  and  to  bear  all  the  expense.  The  entertain- 
ment took  place  on  February  27,  and  cost  one  hundred  thousand 
livres.  The  riding  ring  was  brilliantly  decorated;  the  ball-room 
was  made  to  look  like  a  fair,  with  seven  covered  streets  laid  out 
in  it,  bordered  by  booths,  cafes,  and  spectacles ;  Gluck's  comic 
opera,  "  Le  Poirier  ou  1'Arbre  Enchante,"  was  given.  There  was 
a  ball  with  Hungarian  and  Flemish  quadrilles,  supper,  play,  and 
everything  that  was  necessary  to  occupy  and  amuse  one  during 
eight  hours. 

But  all  these  splendours  did  not  succeed  in  effacing  the  bad 
impression  made  upon  the  public.  Whatever  Mercy  may  say, 
the  French  princes  —  and  it  is  a  friend  of  the  queen  who  says 
it* — were  in  the  right;  and  although  Marie  Antoinette  had  no 
intention  of  wounding  them,  and  with  her  indulgent  kindness, 
which  was  the  basis  of  her  character,  received  them  some  days 
after  with  great  cordiality,  they  resented  the  support  which  she 
had  given  to  her  brother's  pretensions. 

They  exaggerated  and  made  malicious  comments  on  the  mis- 
takes which  this  brother  committed ;  they  remarked  that  he 
seemed  indifferent  to  all  the  scientific  or  artistic  wonders  which 
were  shown  to  him.  Notably  they  recalled  how  on  his  visit  to 
the  Jardin  du  Roi  at  Paris,  when  Buffon,  who  did  the  honours  of 
the  place,  presented  his  works  to  him  as  a  mark  of  homage,  he 
had  only  answered  with  excessive  politeness,  "  I  should  be  very 
sorry  to  deprive  you  of  them."  They  affected  to  applaud  to 
exaggeration  the  Due  de  Chartres,  who,  as  a  beginning  to  that 
annoying  and  systematic  opposition  to  the  court  which  was  to 
carry  him  so  far,  made  a  point  of  showing  himself  in  public  in  Paris 
during  the  entertainments  at  Versailles,  from  which  he  was  ex- 
cluded. The  jests  at  the  brother  turned  into  complaints  against 
the  sister.  They  regarded  as  a  crime  of  leze-nation  the  vivacity, 
perhaps  imprudent,  of  her  very  natural  affection ;  and  the  name  of 


126  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

"  Austrian,"  invented  by  the  jealousy  of  Madame  Adelaide,  passed 
from  mouth  to  mouth,  summarizing  in  this  word,  suited  to  catch 
the  popular  imagination,  the  accusation  against  the  queen  of  sac- 
rificing everything  to  her  country  and  family. 

And  yet  no  accusation  was  ever  more  unjust.  Without  enter- 
ing here  into  the  details  which  we  shall  take  up  later,  it  is  suffi- 
cient to  recall  that  upon  twenty  different  occasions  Maria  Theresa 
reproached  Marie  Antoinette  for  forgetting  her  country  and 
family,  for  losing  its  traditions  and  customs,  even  its  awkward- 
nesses, for  being  almost  ashamed  of  being  German,  for  neglecting 
the  Germans,  for  showing  them  "  little  cordiality  or  protection." 
"  German  blood  runs  in  your  veins,"  she  cried  in  her  semi-German 
speech;  "do  not  be  ashamed  of  it."  Joseph  II.  addressed  to  his 
sister  the  same  reproaches  as  her  mother;  he  found  her  too 
French.  When  Maximilian  and  Rosenberg  went  to  Versailles, 
he  wished  to  recommend  them  to  speak  only  German  to  her. 
Hindered  in  this  project,  whose  realization,  it  must  be  said,  would 
have  been  a  supreme  breach  of  etiquette,  he  had  written  the 
queen  a  letter  in  German  ;  and  this  woman,  who  is  accused  of  hav- 
ing heart  and  thought  only  for  her  native  country,  had  so  far  for- 
gotten her  mother  tongue  that  she  was  obliged  to  get  Mercy  to 
translate  the  emperor's  letter,  to  such  a  degree  had  she  lost  the 
habit,  not  only  of  speaking  German,  but  of  reading  it,  writing  it, 
and  understanding  it.  Yet  this  could  not  stop  calumny,  nor 
hinder  the  courtiers  from  maliciously  calling  Trianon  "  Little 
Vienna." 


CHAPTER    XI. 

CORONATION  OF  THE  KING.  —  CELEBRATIONS  AT  RHEIMS.  —  EMOTION  OF 
THE  QUEEN;  HER  LETTER  TO  THE  EMPRESS.  —  MARRIAGE  OF  MA- 
DAME CLOTILDE. —  RENEWED  AND  VAIN  EFFORTS  TO  RECALL  CHOI- 
SEUL.  —  TRIAL  OF  THE  COMTE  DE  GUINES.  —  EXILE  OF  THE  Due 
D'AIGUILLON.  —  NOMINATION  OF  MALESHERBES.  —  REFORMS  OF  TUR- 
GOT;  COMPLAINTS  WHICH  THEY  AROUSED.  —  FALL  OF  TURGOT. —  THE 
SHARE  WHICH  THE  QUEEN  HAD  IN  IT. —  LETTER  OF  MERCY  TO  MARIA 
THERESA. 

ON  June  5,  1775,  Louis  XVI.  left  Versailles,  accompanied  by 
the  queen,  Monsieur,  Madame,  and  the  Comte  d'Artois, 
on  his  way  to  Compiegne,  where  he  arrived  at  ten  o'clock  in  the 
evening.  On  the  8th  he  left  Compiegne  to  sleep  at  Fismes ;  on 
the  Qth  he  took  the  road  to  Rheims.  He  went  there  to  receive 
the  benediction  of  his  crown,  and  the  solemn  consecration  of  the 
title  which  he  held  from  his  ancestors,  and  the  visible  sign  of  that 
grace  of  God  in  the  name  of  which  he  reigned.  The  coronation 
was,  in  France,  a  national  tradition  ;  the  people  found  in  the  oaths 
which  the  monarch  took  a  recognition  of  his  rights  ;  and  if  certain 
philosophers  like  D'Alembert  and  Condorcet,  carried  away  by 
their  sceptical  passions,  only  saw  in  it  "  a  bizarre  and  absurd 
ceremony,"  entailing  "  the  most  useless  as  well  as  the  most  ridicu- 
lous of  useless  expenditures,"  personages  not  less  celebrated,  and 
whom  we  cannot  accuse  of  superstition,  like  Mirabeau,  wrote, 
"  The  grandest  of  all  events  for  a  people  is  without  doubt  the 
inauguration  of  their  king.  It  is  then  that  Heaven  consecrates 
our  monarchs  and  strengthens  in  some  way  the  ties  that  bind 
us  to  them." 

Mercy  would  have  wished  to  have  the  queen  crowned  at  the 
same  time  as  the  king.  It  seemed  to  him  that  under  the  circum- 
stances, and  Marie  Antoinette  not  being  a  mother,  the  divine 
blessing  would  give  her  in  the  eyes  of  the  nation  the  aureole  with 
which  maternity  had  not  surrounded  her. 


128  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

A  brochure,  written  by  a  priest  of  the  oratory,  proved  that  the 
consecration  of  the  queens  had  been  a  constant  custom  to  the 
time  of  Marie  de  Medicis,  and  that  if  it  had  fallen  into  desuetude 
it  was  only  because  neither  Louis  XIII.  nor  his  successors  had 
been  married  at  the  time  of  their  coronation.  Mercy,  who,  if  he 
were  not  the  instigator  of  this  brochure,  was  at  least  the  ardent 
propagator  of  it,  got  Vermond  to  talk  to  the  queen,  and  took  care 
that  the  manuscript  was  given  to  the  Due  de  Duras,  and  by  the 
Due  de  Duras  to  the  king.  But  the  queen  remained  sufficiently 
indifferent  to  the  overture,  and  the  king  did  not  seem  affected  by 
it.  Did  his  affection  for  his  wife  have  to  contend  against  consid- 
erations of  economy,  which  had  already  deferred  the  ceremony 
for  a  year?  Or  was  it  circumvented  by  Maurepas,  incessantly  on 
guard  against  anything  that  might  strengthen  the  power  of  the 
young  sovereign?  However  that  may  be,  Marie  Antoinette  was 
present  only  as  a  spectator  at  the  coronation  of  her  husband. 
While  the  king  made  his  entrance  in  a  coach  eighteen  feet  high, 
received  from  the  hands  of  the  Due  de  Bourbon,  governor  of 
Champagne,  the  keys  of  the  city,  and  was  himself  received  by  the 
archbishop  of  Rheims  at  the  door  of  the  cathedral,  where  was 
solemnly  chanted  the  Te  Deum,  the  queen  left  Compiegne  in  the 
evening  of  the  8th  with  only  Monsieur,  Madame,  and  the  Comte 
d'Artois,  and  arrived  incognito  in  the  city  of  the  coronation  at 
one  o'clock  in  the  morning.  But  in  default  of  official  compli- 
ments, she  received  popular  acclamations.  On  one  of  those 
beautiful  moonlight  nights  when  the  silver  light  is  particularly 
luminous  and  soft,  an  immense  crowd  congregated  on  the  high- 
ways and  at  the  gates  of  the  city  to  witness  the  arrival  of  the  wife 
of  the  king.  The  enthusiastic  vivats  greeting  her  passage  alone 
broke  the  silence  of  the  night,  which  filled  the  soul  with  peace, 
and  with  sweet  and  pure  emotions.  On  the  following  morning, 
in  despite  of  the  incognito,  all  the  nobility  of  the  city  and  sur- 
rounding country  thronged  the  apartments  of  the  archbishop's 
palace,  where  the  queen  was  lodged,  and  departed  enraptured 
with  the  grace  and  amiability  of  the  young  sovereign.  In  the 
afternoon  there  was  a  similar  ovation ;  it  was  to  the  cries  of 
"  Long  live  the  queen !  "  that  she  traversed  the  streets  of  Rheims 
on  her  way  to  the  intendance,  to  witness  the  entrance  of  the 
king ;  and  in  the  evening  the  clergy  and  the  corps  de  ville  came 
to  offer  her  an  address,  to  which  she  replied  with  discretion  and 
amiability. 


CORONATION    OF    THE    KING.  I2Q 

On  Sunday,  the  nth,  at  six  o'clock  in  the  morning, the  canons, 
in  their  copes,  entered  their  stalls  in  the  choir  of  the  basilica; 
they  were  soon  followed  by  the  archbishop,  the  cardinals,  the 
ministers,  etc.  At  half-past  six  the  lay  peers  took  their  places. 
At  seven  o'clock,  the  king,  led  by  the  bishop-duke  of  Laon  and  the 
bishop-count  of  Beauvais,  arrived  at  the  cathedral.  After  being 
addressed  on  the  threshold  by  the  Cardinal  de  la  Roche-Aymon, 
who  felicitated  him  on  having  all  the  virtues,  and  in  particular 
the  love  of  order,  he  entered  the  ancient  edifice  to  the  noise  of 
popular  acclamations ;  and  the  archbishop,  after  having  admin- 
istered to  him  the  oath  on  the  Book  of  the  Gospels,  poured  on 
his  head,  breast,  and  shoulders  some  drops  of  the  holy  oil,  which 
had  been  solemnly  carried  from  the  Abbey  of  St.  Remy  by 
the  grand  prior,  wearing  a  coat  of  cloth-of-gold,  and  mounted 
upon  a  white  horse  covered  with  a  housing  of  cloth-of-silver 
richly  embroidered.  The  king  was  then  invested  with  the 
royal  cloak,  and  received  from  the  hands  of  the  archbishop 
the  crown,  the  sceptre,  the  main  de  justice,  and  the  sword  of 
Charlemagne.  Then,  followed  by  the  peers  and  high  officials, 
he  was  conducted  to  the  throne,  raised  upon  the  rood-loft;  after 
which  the  archbishop  and  the  peers  gave  him  the  kiss  of  peace, 
saying,  "  Vivat  rex  in  atcrnum."  The  multitude  who  filled  the 
galleries  echoed  these  words.  Immediately  the  doors  were 
thrown  open,  and  the  people  pressed  into  the  basilica  with  cries 
of  joy. 

The  queen,  from  the  tribune,  followed  all  the  phases  of  the 
ceremony.  At  the  moment  of  the  crowning  and  throning, 
touched  to  the  heart  by  the  beauty  of  the  church  rites,  and  still 
more  by  the  popular  acclamations,  which  interrupted  the  order 
of  them  and  emphasized  the  details,  she  could  not  control  herself, 
and  shed  abundant  tears.  Her  emotion  was  so  great  that  for  a 
moment  she  was  obliged  to  leave  her  place.  When  she  reap- 
peared an  instant  later,  her  eyes  still  wet  with  tears,  the  king 
looked  at  her  affectionately,  and  a  visible  air  of  content  spread 
itself  over  his  face.  Despite  the  holiness  of  the  place,  the  church 
resounded  with  cries  and  clapping  of  hands.  All  present  were 
touched,  and  tears  ran  from  many  eyes,  which  caused  those  of 
the  queen  to  flow  afresh. 

Louis  XVI.  had  forbidden  them  to  drape  the  streets  along  his 
route,  in  order,  he  said,  to  see  and  be  better  seen  by  his  people. 
On  the  very  day  of  the  coronation,  at  seven  o'clock  in  the  evening, 
VOL.  i. — 9 


130  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  king,  with  the  queen  on  his  arm,  went  in  his  ordinary  costume, 
and  without  other  following  than  the  captain  of  the  guards  and 
a  few  police  officers,  to  walk  in  the  long  wooden  gallery  which 
served  as  passage  between  the  archbishop's  palace  and  the 
church.  There  were  many  people  in  the  gallery,  and  a  great 
many  without.  The  king  forbade  them  to  drive  any  one  out, 
or  to  hinder  any  one  from  approaching.  The  populace,  happy 
and  grateful,  pressed  about  the  royal  couple,  from  whom  they 
were  only  separated  by  a  low  balustrade.  During  more  than  an 
hour  the  king  and  queen  remained  thus  lost  in  the  crowd,  re- 
sponding with  great  grace  to  their  demonstrations,  allowing 
themselves  to  be  addressed  and  looked  at,  and  showing  to  each 
one  marks  of  kindness.  It  was  the  queen  who  had  first  sug- 
gested this  promenade;  the  public  knew  it,  and  thanked  her  for 
it  by  their  acclamations. 

When  we  think  that  these  popular  acclamations  were  manifested 
in  the  midst  of  universal  contempt;  that  bread  was  dear;  that  the 
reform  measures  of  Turgot,  adroitly  used  by  his  enemies,  had 
excited  uneasiness  on  all  sides ;  and  that  two  months  before,  riots 
had  broken  out  at  Dijon,  at  Versailles,  and  at  Paris,  — we  do  not 
know  which  to  admire  the  more  under  the  circumstances,  the  obsti- 
nate attachment  of  the  nation  to  its  princes,  which  might  have 
been  so  great  a  power  in  the  hands  of  clever  ministers,  or  that  in- 
credible fickleness  of  the  French  character  which  passes  so  easily 
from  enthusiasm  to  anger,  and  which  with  young  and  inexperi- 
enced sovereigns  like  Louis  XVI.  and  Marie  Antoinette,  with 
light-minded  ministers  like  Maurepas,  or  one  who  disdained  ob- 
stacles like  Turgot,  became  so  formidable  a  danger.  The  queen 
did  not  hide  it  from  herself,  and  if  her  happiness  were  complete, 
her  confidence  was  not  without  alloy. 

"  It  is  a  very  astonishing  thing,  and  a  fortunate  one  at  the  same  time," 
she  wrote  to  her  mother,  "  that  \ve  should  have  been  so  well  received  two 
months  after  the  revolt,  and  despite  the  dearness  of  bread,  which  unfor- 
tunately continues.  It  is  a  marvellous  trait  in  the  French  character  to 
allow  itself  to  be  so  easily  carried  away  by  evil  suggestions,  and  to  return 
to  the  good  so  quickly.  Truly,  in  seeing  these  people,  who  in  their  mis- 
fortune have  treated  us  thus  well,  we  are  the  more  obliged  to  work  for 
their  good.  The  king  seemed  to  me  to  be  penetrated  by  this  truth.  As 
for  me,  I  know  that  I  shall  never  forget  the  day  of  the  coronation  during 
my  whole  life,  if  it  should  last  two  hundred  years.  My  dear  mamma, 
who  is  so  good,  would  have  shared  our  happiness." 


MARRIAGE     OF   MADAME    CLOTILDE.  131 

The  ceremony  lasted  four  days.  On  the  I2th  the  regiment  of 
hussars  of  the  Comte  Esterhazy  went  through  some  manoeuvres 
at  a  short  distance  from  the  city,  which  the  queen  and  Madame 
witnessed.  On  the  I3th  the  king  was  solemnly  made  grand 
master  of  his  order,  and  afterward  held  the  chapter.  On  the 
I4th,  according  to  an  ancient  custom,  he  betook  himself  on 
horseback  to  the  Abbey  of  St.  Remy,  there  heard  mass,  and 
on  leaving  the  church,  touched  more  than  two  hundred  sick  per- 
sons in  the  park,  to  whom  he  ordered  alms  to  be  distributed. 
The  queen  went  to  a  private  house  to  witness  the  passage  of  the 
procession.  In  the  evening  the  young  couple  drove  in  a  car- 
riage, amid  the  vivats  of  the  people,  round  a  beautiful  prome- 
nade which  enci-rcled  the  city.  But  it  was  everywhere  the  queen 
who  attracted  attention.  "  She  has  borne  herself  on  every  occa- 
sion," Mercy  wrote,  "with  dignity,  amiability,  and  grace;  and  if 
the  homage  which  has  been  rendered  to  her  has  been  extraor- 
dinary and  universal,  it  is  certain  that  never  was  homage  better 
deserved." 

On  the  i6th  the  court  returned  to  Compiegne;  on  the  ipth, 
to  Versailles. 

New  festivals  there  awaited  them.  On  February  12,  the  king 
had  announced  the  marriage  of  his  sister  Clotilde  to  Charles 
Emanuel  of  Savoy,  prince  of  Piedmont,  oldest  son  of  the  king 
of  Sardinia.  On  August  21,  the  marriage  was  celebrated  in  the 
chapel  of  the  chateau.  There  was  a  public  dinner,  games  of 
chance,  a  ball  at  the  court,  and  a  ball  at  the  house  of  the  Comte 
de  Viry,  ambassador  from  Sardinia.  With  what  brilliancy  the 
queen  appeared  at  these  fetes,  Walpole  has  told  us  in  a  letter 
which  we  have  quoted  above.  There  was  on  seeing  her  a  general 
cry  of  admiration. 

On  the  28th  Madame  Clotilde  said  farewell  to  her  French 
family  and  set  out  for  Turin.  Her  departure  was  no  great  grief 
to  the  queen.  For  a  time  while  she  was  still  dauphiness,  she  had 
been  sufficiently  intimate  with  her  young  sister-in-law,  whose 
sweet  and  kindly  nature  she  appreciated;  she  had  been  present 
at  balls  in  her  apartment,  or  at  representations  of  small  comedies, 
which  had  been  an  amusement  and  had  served  to  complete  their 
education.  But  their  intimacy  had  not  lasted  long.  Soon,  under 
the  influence  of  her  governess,  Madame  de  Marsan,  who  was  in 
name  and  heart  "  her  dear  little  friend,"  the  young  princess  had 
become  estranged  from  her  royal  sister-in-law.  After  the  death 


132  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

of  Louis  XV.  Madame  Clotilde  had  lived  apart,  and  her  marriage 
left  no  void  at  the  court.  We  should  say  rather  that  it  was  a 
relief  to  Marie  Antoinette,  as  it  put  an  end  to  the  duties  of 
Madame  de  Marsan,  and  thus  diminished  the  importance  of  a 
woman  who  had  always  shown  herself,  and  still  showed  herself, 
one  of  her  most  implacable  and  dangerous  enemies. 

The  queen  at  that  time,  moreover,  was  preoccupied  with  other 
things.  At  the  instigation  of  the  friends  of  Choiseul,  with  whom 
she  was  surrounded,  and  despite  her  mother,  who  feared  for  the 
Austrian  policy  the  activity  and  clear-sightedness  of  the  former 
minister,  she  was  contemplating  having  him  recalled  to  court. 
At  the  time  of  the  consecration,  Choiseul,  in  the  rank  of  chevalier 
of  the  orders  of  the  king,  had  gone  to  Rheims,  and  the  queen  had 
granted  him  an  audience.  She  had  done  more ;  and  with  femi- 
nine diplomacy,  which  she  boasted  of  in  a  regrettable  letter  to 
the  Count  von  Rosenberg,  and  which  drew  upon  her  the  just  re- 
proaches of  Maria  Theresa,  she  had  found  means  to  make  Louis 
XVI.  himself  fix  the  hour  of  the  audience.  The  affair  was  soon 
known  to  the  public,  and  the  reinstatement  of  Choiseul  in  the 
council  was  looked  for.  He  himself  affected  an  air  of  confidence  ; 
"  he  sniffed  the  air,"  as  a  chronicler  has  said,  "  in  a  way  charac- 
teristic of  his  audacious  genius."  "  I  dare  say,"  Marie  Antoi- 
nette wrote  on  her  part,  "  that  old  Maurepas  was  afraid  of  being 
sent  to  take  a  little  rest  at  home."  But  was  such  indeed  the 
intention  of  the  young  sovereign? 

Had  she  not  wished  simply  to  bestow  a  mark  of  public  favour 
on  the  man  who  had  negotiated  her  marriage?  Had  she  not 
contemplated  asking  advice  from  a  man  to  whom  no  one  denied 
intelligence,  or  did  she  put  such  confidence  in  him  that  she  wished 
to  further  his  views?  If  such  were  her  intention,  her  plan  failed. 
The  king  persisted  in  his  coldness  and  in  his  dislike;  the  queen 
herself  was  sufficiently  ill  pleased  with  her  interview,  in  which 
Choiseul  showed  himself  to  be  selfish  rather  than  loyal,  and  re- 
fused to  lend  herself  to  certain  of  his  insinuations,  and  the  fallen 
minister  returned  to  his  retirement  never  to  leave  it  again. 

The  queen,  nevertheless,  continued  to  be  surrounded  by  the 
friends  of  Choiseul,  to  submit  to  their  influence,  and  to  espouse 
their  quarrels ;  it  would  seem  as  though  she  regarded  this  as  a 
debt  of  gratitude.  She  had  lately  given  a  striking  proof  of  this 
to  the  eyes  of  all,  in  the  trial  of  the  Comte  de  Guines.  This 
Comte  de  Guines,  ambassador  to  London,  after  having  been  min- 


TRIAL   OF   THE    COMTE   DE   GUINES.  133 

ister  to  Berlin,  —  a  man  of  intelligence,  amiable,  but  ambitious 
and  unprincipled,  an  intimate  friend  of  Choiseul,  —  had  been  ac- 
cused of  smuggling  into  England  under  cover  of  his  ambassador's 
franks,  and  of  having  speculated  at  the  Bourse  by  means  of  infor- 
mation which  he  had  received  from  his  official  position.  He 
threw  all  the  blame  upon  his  secretary,  Tort  de  la  Sonde ;  but 
the  latter  proved  that  he  had  acted  only  under  the  command  of 
his  chief.  The  case  was  carried  before  the  Parliament  of  Paris ; 
it  was  an  event.  "Every  one  is  interested  in  this  affair,  —  some 
from  friendship,  others  from  curiosity,"  wrote  Madame  du 
Deffand,  who  was  not  less  interested  than  every  one  else.  The 
Due  d'Aiguillon,  incidentally  involved  in  the  debate,  used  all  his 
power  against  Monsieur  de  Guines,  who,  on  the  other  hand,  was 
supported  by  all  the  friends  of  Choiseul.  It  was  correspondence 
against  correspondence,  requisition  against  requisition,  memoir 
against  memoir.  The  queen,  won  over  by  those  around  her, 
declared  for  the  ambassador,  and  did  so  with  all  the  passionate 
ardour  she  brought  to  her  friendships.  The  Comte  de  Guines 
had  thought  it  necessary  for  his  justification  to  insert  in  the  me- 
moirs written  in  his  favour  certain  passages  from  his  former 
ministerial  correspondence.  Monsieur  de  Vergennes  refused  to 
allow  him  to  do  so,  alleging  that  if  he  granted  any  such  demand, 
the  secrecy  necessary  in  the  affairs  of  State  would  be  violated,  and 
that  no  foreign  minister  would  again  dare  to  make  confidential 
communications  to  the  ministers  of  France.  The  council  unani- 
mously upheld  the  decision  of  Vergennes;  but  the  queen,  urged 
by  her  friends,  used  such  persuasion  with  the  king  that,  despite 
this  vote,  the  permission  solicited  was  granted.  A  little  later,  a 
memoir  of  the  Comte  de  Guines  having  been  suppressed  by  a 
decree  of  the  council  of  State  as  libellous  against  the  Due  d'Ai- 
guillon, the  king,  at  the  instigation  of  the  queen,  nevertheless 
sent  word  to  the  ambassador  that  he  might  make  use  of  the  me- 
moir which  had  been  suppressed,  and  to  the  judges  that  they 
should  give  heed  to  it.  Finally,  in  the  beginning  of  June,  1775, 
the  case  was  adjudged ;  Tort  de  la  Sonde  was  sentenced  as  ca- 
lumniator to  make  honourable  reparation  to  his  former  chief  be- 
fore twelve  witnesses,  and  the  ambassador  returned  in  triumph  to 
take  possession  of  his  post. 

At  the  same  time  the  Due  d'Aiguillon,  who  had  made  great 
preparations  to  go  to  Rheims  as  captain  of  tbe  light  horse,  was  for- 
bidden to  be  present  at  the  coronation,  and  was  ordered  to  retire 
to  his  estates  of  Guyenne, 


134  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

"  This  departure  is  altogether  my  work,"  Marie  Antoinette  wrote  to  the 
Count  von  Rosenberg.  "  The  measure  was  full ;  that  wicked  man  had 
maintained  all  sorts  of  espionage  and  evil  report.  He  had  sought  to 
brave  me  more  than  once  in  this  affair  of  Monsieur  de  Guines;  immedi- 
ately after  the  sentence  I  requested  his  withdrawal  of  the  king.  It  is  true 
that  I  did  not  ask  for  a  lettre  de  cachet,  but  nothing  is  lost ;  for  instead  of 
remaining  in  Touraiue,  as  he  wished,  he  has  been  requested  to  continue 
his  route  as  far  as  Aiguillon,  which  is  in  Gascony." 

The  king  had  not  shown  any  reluctance  to  exile  the  Due  d'Ai- 
guillon,  who  was  in  his  eyes  the  last  representative  of  the  odious 
cabal  of  Madame  du  Barry.  This  interference  of  the  queen  in 
the  quarrels  of  the  court  was  none  the  less  to  be  regretted ;  it 
made  her  descend  from  her  serene  throne,  from  the  height  of 
which  a  sovereign  should  soar  above  all  party  factions,  to  throw 
the  weight  of  her  name  and  personality  into  the  struggles  of 
every  day;  she  made  adversaries  of  all  the  enemies  of  her  friends. 
This  first  step  was  to  carry  her  further,  to  an  action  more  serious 
and  more  grievous;  after  having  made  the  mistake  of  taking  part 
in  this  trial,  she  was  to  make  the  more  serious  mistake  of  inter- 
fering between  the  king  and  his  ministers. 

The  progressive  cabinet,  of  which  the  appointment  of  Turgot 
had  been  the  signal  and  the  beginning,  was  finally  completed  by 
the  nomination  of  the  Comte  de  Saint-Germain  in  the  place  of 
the  Marechal  du  Muy,  who  had  died  in  frightful  agony,  and  of 
Malesherbes  in  the  place  of  the  detested  Due  de  la  Vrilliere. 
"  Although  he  is  hard  of  hearing,"  Marie  Antoinette  wrote  jest- 
ingly of  this  latter,  "  he  has  none  the  less  heard  that  it  was  time 
for  him  to  go  before  the  door  was  shut  in  his  face." 

The  public  applauded  these  appointments,  and  the  queen  either 
had  no  share  in  them,  or  had  herself  approved  them.  She  had 
desired  Sartines  rather  than  Malesherbes ;  and  it  is  certain  that 
the  talents  of  the  former  lieutenant  of  police  seemed  to  fit  him 
for  that  place  in  the  household  of  the  king.  But  after  her  first 
impulse  of  anger  she  had  made  the  best  of  it,  and  had  received 
the  new  minister  graciously ;  she  had  lent  herself  with  the  great- 
est good- will  to  the  reforms  of  Turgot  She  herself,  at  the 
beginning  of  her  reign,  had  urged  economy  in  the  maintenance 
of  the  court,  had  forbidden  gold  and  silver  ornaments,  and 
consented,  without  the  least  difficulty,  to  the  reductions  made 
in  her  household ;  she  had  even,  it  was  said,  approved  of  the 
changes  which  the  Comte  de  Saint-Germain  had  made  in  the 


REFORMS    OF   TURGOT.  135 

army,  although  her  knowledge  on  this  point  could  not  have  been 
great. 

But  these  reforms  could  not  be  put  into  execution  without 
wounding  the  vanity  of  some  and  injuring  the  interest  of  others. 
The  ordinance  of  the  Comte  de  Saint-Germain  concerning  the 
strokes  with  the  flat  of  the  sword  had  incensed  the  army. 
"  Colonel,"  replied  a  grenadier  to  an  officer,  who  tried  to  per- 
suade him  that  such  a  punishment  had  nothing  dishonourable  in 
it,  "  in  the  matter  of  swords  I  only  recognize  the  point."  Tur- 
got's  system  of  free  commerce  in  cereals  had  excited  revolts  in 
different  parts  of  France ;  they  were  obliged  to  employ  force 
against  these  riots,  and  the  discontented  public  avenged  itself  by 
singing  couplets  against  the  comptroller-general  and  his  general, 
Jean  Farine.  Turgot's  other  reforms  excited  no  less  dissatisfac- 
tion. The  abolition  of  statute-labour,  the  suppression  of  the 
wardenships  and  masterships,  were  only  enregistered  by  Parlia- 
ment with  the  solemn  and  sinister  ceremony  of  a  bed  of  justice. 
The  President  d'Aligre  had  protested  against  them  with  sombre 
energy.  Public  opinion  became  more  and  more  hostile  to  the 
measures  of  the  minister  ;  they  were  criticised  in  the  salons,  at- 
tacked in  pamphlets,  jeered  at  in  song.  More  of  a  philosopher 
than  a  politician,  Turgot,  with  his  upright  and  somewhat  naive 
disposition,  with  his  stiff  and  uncompromising  character,  was  not 
disturbed  either  by  the  criticisms,  the  attacks,  or  the  songs. 

"  He  saw  everything  as  an  abstraction,  and  disdained  to  turn 
his  attention  to  facts,"  so  wrote  a  man  who  loved  him  much. 
"  He  paid  no  attention  to  the  country  which  he  ruled,  to  the 
century  in  which  he  lived,  to  the  established  institutions,  the 
ordinary  customs,  to  prejudices  and  interests.  .  .  .  He  wished  to 
govern  according  to  theory,  regarding  man  only  as  an  intelligent 
being,  and  not  as  a  creature  led  by  his  emotions  and  passions." 
He  did  not  destroy  obstacles  as  Richelieu  would  have  done,  nor 
push  them  aside  as  Mazarin  would  have  done ;  he  ignored  them, 
and  even  seemed  not  to  see  them.  The  fleeting  enthusiasm  for 
the  novelties  of  Turgot,  a  competent  judge  has  said,  soon  gave 
place  to  irritation  because  Turgot  was,  as  we  say  to-day,  an  in- 
transigeant.  He  beat  his  head  against  the  prejudices  of  his  time, 
managed  no  one,  the  king  as  little  as  others,  and  finished  by  set- 
ting the  whole  world  against  him.  Here  is  what  the  ambassador 
from  Sweden,  the  Count  of  Creutz,  stated  in  the  letter  he  wrote 
to  Gustavus  III.  on  March  14,  1776,  two  days  after  the  bed  of  jus- 


136  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

tice  which  had  seemed  to  sanction  the  triumphant  minister: 
"  Monsieur  Turgot  finds  himself  opposed  by  a  most  formidable 
league,  composed  of  all  the  nobles  of  the  kingdom,  of  all  the 
Parliaments,  of  all  the  financiers,  of  all  the  women  of  the  court, 
and  of  all  the  de'vots." 

It  is  not  astonishing  that  in  hearing  round  her  this  ever-swell- 
ing concert  of  complaints,  the  queen  should  have  thought  in 
good  faith  that  she  was  following  public  opinion  in  pronouncing 
against  the  minister  who  was  the  object  of  such  universal  dislike. 
She  thought  also  that  she  had  a  personal  grudge  against  him. 
The  Comte  de  Guines  had  won  his  suit  before  Parliament;  he 
had  not  won  it  completely  before  the  minister.  In  the  beginning 
of  1776  he  was  recalled  from  his  mission  to  London.  His  friends 
were  fire  and  flame ;  the  queen,  indignant  at  the  disgrace  of  a 
man  whom  she  had  honoured  with  her  protection,  accused  Ver- 
gennes,  Malesherbes,  and,  above  all,  Turgot,  whose  hostile  atti- 
tude toward  the  ambassador  she  knew,  of  his  undoing.  She 
resolved  to  avenge  herself,  and  to  obtain  a  double  and  striking 
reparation.  Instigated  by  her  friends,  encouraged  by  Maurepas, 
who  in  his  heart  began  to  be  afraid  of  the  storm  gathering  on  all 
sides  against  Turgot,  and  who  was  not  sorry  to  be  delivered  from 
a  colleague  who  had  grown  to  be  embarrassing,  she  succeeded  in 
persuading  the  king  to  take  up  the  quarrel.  On  May  10  the 
Comte  de  Guines  received  the  following  note :  — 

"  When  I  sent  you  word,  Monsieur,  that  the  time  which  I  had  fixed 
for  your  mission  was  over,  I  also  said  that  I  should  reserve  to  myself  the 
pleasure  of  granting  you  the  reward  which  you  deserved.  I  do  justice  to 
your  conduct,  and  accord  to  you  the  honours  of  the  Louvre,  with  the 
permission  to  bear  the  title  of  duke.  I  do  not  doubt,  Monsieur,  that 
these  favours  will  but  serve  to  redouble  —  if  that  be  possible  —  the  zeal 
which  you  have  shown  in  my  service.  You  may  show  this  letter." 

It  was  the  queen  who  had  requested  this  note ;  it  was  even  she, 
so  it  is  asserted,  who  dictated  it.  In  the  heat  of  her  anger,  she 
had  desired  that  this  official  rehabilitation  of  the  ambassador 
should  coincide  with  the  fall  of  his  adversaries,  and  that  Turgot 
should  be  sent  to  the  Bastille.  Mercy  succeeded  in  preventing 
this  outrage;  but  on  May  12  Maurepas  signified  to  the  comp- 
troller-general his  dismissal. 

The  public,  so  it  is  asserted,  was  less  shocked  at  this  inter- 
ference of  the  queen  than  struck  by  the  cleverness  which  she  had 


MERCY'S    LETTER   TO    MARIA   THERESA.  137 

shown  in  the  affair.  It  admired  her  diplomacy  and  did  not  doubt 
her  power.  His  overthrow,  however,  was  none  the  less  unfor- 
tunate, and  the  part  which  Marie  Antoinette  took  in  it,  despite 
the  wave  of  opinion  which  had  seemed  to  urge  her  on,  still  more 
unfortunate.  Perhaps  she  regretted  it;  in  any  case  she  showed 
some  embarrassment,  for  in  her  correspondence  with  her  mother, 
she  sought  to  deny  all  connivance  at  the  dismissal  of  Turgot 
and  Malesherbes.  But  she  had  not  been  able  to  resist  the  insinu- 
ations of  those  about  her. 

"  Your  Majesty  will  without  doubt  be  surprised,"  Mercy  wrote  to  Maria 
Theresa,  "  that  the  Comte  de  Guines,  for  whom  the  queen  can  have  no 
personal  affection,  is  yet  the  cause  of  such  great  events ;  but  the  key  to 
the  enigma  lies  in  the  persons  about  the  queen,  who  are  all  united  in  favour 
01  the  Comte  de  Guines.  Her  Majesty  is  possessed  ;  she  tries  to  free  her- 
self ;  they  succeed  in  piquing  her  vanity,  in  irritating  her,  in  defaming 
those  who  for  the  general  good  oppose  her  wishes  ;  all  this  is  accomplished 
during  her  promenades  or  other  pleasure-parties,  in  conversation  at  the  en- 
tertainments of  the  Princesse  de  Guemenee ;  finally,  they  succeed  so  well  in 
keeping  the  queen  beside  herself,  in  enervating  her  with  dissipation,  that 
joined  to  the  extreme  condescension  of  the  king,  there  are  at  certain  times 
no  means  of  making  her  listen  to  reason." 

These  lines  of  Mercy  are  serious;  they  paint  darkly,  no  doubt, 
but  at  bottom  with  but  too  great  truth,  an  unhappy  period  in  the 
life  of  the  queen  which  we  will  call  the  period  of  dissipation.  It 
would  seem  that,  dazzled  by  the  glory  of  the  throne  she  had  just 
ascended,  intoxicated  perhaps  by  public  applause,  possessed 
—  to  use  Mercy's  term  —  by  those  about  her  who  took  advan- 
tage of  her  youth,  Marie  Antoinette  only  saw  the  smooth  side  of 
life,  which  had  too  early  opened  before  her.  Maria  Theresa  was 
right  in  saying  that  it  would  have  required  six  more  years  to 
confirm  in  the  queen  that  reserve  and  reflection  which  we  have 
seen  growing,  and  for  maturity  of  age  to  have  brought  that  of 
reason  with  it.  This  too  early  possession  of  absolute  power  by 
sovereigns  who  were  so  young  and  so  new  came  to  spoil  every- 
thing, and  to  make  everything  precarious.  There  followed  dur- 
ing some  years  flights  of  thoughtlessness,  inordinate  love  of 
pleasures  which  were  lawful  beyond  doubt,  but  "  hazardous,"  as 
the  emperor  said, — even  imprudent  acts,  which  are  to  be  re- 
gretted, if  you  will,  but  of  which  we  must  not  exaggerate  the  im- 
portance, and  for  which  we  must  seek  the  causes. 


CHAPTER   XII. 

PERIOD  OF  DISSIPATION.  —  HORSE-RACES.  —  HUNTS  IN  THE  Bois  DE 
BOULOGNE. —  SLEIGH-RIDES. — VISITS  TO  PARIS.  —  BALLS  AT  THE 
OPERA.  —  THE  ADVENTURE  OF  MONSIEUR.  —  THE  QUEEN  IN  A  CAB; 
HER  NEGLECT  OF  ETIQUETTE.  —  THE  UNFORTUNATE  CONDE- 
SCENSION OF  THE  KING.  —  EXPENDITURES  OF  THE  QUEEN  ;  HER 
JEWELS.  —  PLAY.  —  THE  BANKERS  AT  FONTAINEBLEAU.  —  DESPITE 
EVERYTHING  THE  QUEEN  REMAINS  FAITHFUL  TO  HER  HABITS  OF 
PIETY.  —  WHAT  MERCY  THINKS  OF  THE  CHARACTER  AND  CONDUCT 
OF  MARIE  ANTOINETTE  DURING  THIS  PERIOD.  —  OPINION  OF  THE 
PRINCE  DE  LIGNE.  —  OPINION  OF  THE  COUNT  VON  GOLTZ.  —  A  PAGE 

FROM   THE    COMTE   D'HAUSSONVILLE. 

THE  last  days  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XV.  had  been  sad.  Marie 
Antoinette,  who  had  held  aloof  from  the  amusements  of 
the  king,  owing  to  her  antipathy  to  Madame  du  Barry,  hardly 
daring  to  organize  even  private  amusements  with  the  young  royal 
family  for  fear  of  seeming  to  condemn  those  of  the  old  monarch, 
and  living  apart  in  the  society  of  shrewish  and  bitter  old  maids 
and  a  lady  of  honour  with  no  ideas  save  those  concerning  eti- 
quette,—  Marie  Antoinette  had  been  obliged  to  curb  and  restrain 
her  lively  and  youthful  impulses.  When  at  the  age  of  nineteen  she 
ascended  the  throne  and  became  suddenly  free  to  do  as  she  liked, 
with  a  husband  who  was  almost  as  young  and  as  inexperienced  as 
herself,  who  could  afford  her  no  guidance,  and  whose  character  was 
even  less  decided  than  her  own,  it  would  seem  as  if  her  repressed 
nature  .underwent  a  spontaneous  reaction;  the  sap  of  her  youth, 
which  had  been  checked,  began  to  flow,  and  spread  in  all  its  exu- 
berance. Condemned  during  four  years  to  an  official  ennui, 
the  queen  seemed  to  be  starved  for  pleasure  and  distraction. 
There  were  not  lacking  persons  at  the  court  who  shared  with 
Marie  Antoinette  this  thirst  of  amusement;  and  among  these  the 
chief  was  her  brother-in-law,  the  Comte  d  Artois.  The  Prince  of 
Youth,  as  he  was  called,  constituted  himself  in  a  way  the  organ- 
izer of  his  young  sister-in-law's  entertainments. 


Princesse  Je>  Lamballe. 


HORSE-RACES.  139 


There  were,  first,  horse-races, — a  new  pleasure  recently  im- 
ported from  England.  Anglomania  was  then  the  fashion.  In  spite 
of  the  cutting  reply  which  Louis  XV.  had  made  to  the  Comte  de 
Lauraguais,  many  of  the  young  nobles,  like  the  Comte  d'Artois, 
the  Due  de  Chartres,  the  Due  de  Lauzun,  the  Marquis  de  Con- 
flans,  were  eager  to  introduce  English  customs  into  France.  The 
first  race  took  place  on  March  9,  1775,  on  the  plain  of  Sablons ; 
a  horse  belonging  to  the  Due  de  Lauzun  carried  off  the  prize. 
The  queen  was  present,  "  beautiful  as  the  day,"  as  Matra  said, 
and  the  day  was  superb ;  she  came  with  Monsieur,  Madame,  and 
the  Comtesse  d'Artois.  Other  races  followed  this,  then  became 
a  regular  amusement,  which  took  place  every  week  in  the  en- 
virons of  Paris,  and  for  which  the  young  sovereign  acquired  an 
"  extraordinary  taste ;  "  but  this  amusement  was  not  without  its 
drawbacks.  The  freedom  of  the  races  authorized  a  reprehen- 
sible familiarity.  A  sort  of  platform  had  been  raised  for  the 
queen,  whence  she  overlooked  the  track;  here  the  principal 
amateurs  gathered ;  and  these  amateurs,  carried  away  by  their 
ardour,  did  not  always  preserve  that  form  which  was  proper. 
They  entered  the  pavilion  in  boots  and  morning  dress,  to  the 
horror  of  serious-minded  people.  There  would  be  a  whole  troop 
of  young  people  there,  "  improperly  dressed,"  as  Mercy  said, 
making  such  confusion  and  noise  that  one  could  not  hear  one's 
self  speak,  and  in  the  midst  of  them  the  royal  family,  almost  lost 
in  the  crowd,  without  any  distinction  whatsoever,  —  the  Comte 
d'Artois  running  up  and  down,  betting,  lamenting  noisily  when 
he  lost,  giving  way  to  a  joy  not  less  noisy  when  he  won,  darting 
down  among  the  people  to  encourage  the  postilions  or  jockeys, 
and  returning  to  present  to  the  queen  the  one  who  had  won  the 
prize.  The  queen  might  try  in  vain  to  preserve  in  the  midst  of 
this  promiscuous  crowd  an  air  of  dignity  which  would  lessen  the 
impropriety  of  the  procedure ;  the  public  was  unable  to  appre- 
ciate so  fine  a  distinction,  and  only  saw  the  familiarity  which 
seemed  to  preclude  respect.  The  king  had  not  been  able  to 
bring  himself  to  witness  more  than  one  of  these  diversions;  he 
did  not  dissemble  his  displeasure,  and  the  queen  herself  was  sen- 
sible of  the  impropriety  of  these  English  importations ;  but  led 
on  by  her  ardour,  she  did  not  always  make  her  conduct  accord 
with  her  sentiments. 

At  other  times  there  were  cabriolet-races,  or  deer-hunts  in  the 
Bois  de  Boulogne  with  the  Comte  d'Artois.  The  hunt  ended 


140  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

with  a  dinner  in  a  house  in  the  wood.  The  queen  undoubtedly 
was  never  present  at  these  repasts,  which  public  rumour  censured 
as  too  gay.  However,  they  saw  her  in  Paris  driving  with  her 
brother-in-law  in  the  little  open  carriages  in  which  the  count 
drove  himself,  and  every  one  regretted  that  she  should  associate 
herself  so  openly  in  the  pleasure-parties  of  a  prince  whose  frivolity 
was  so  severely  condemned. 

The  year  1776  brought  other  diversions.  The  winter  was  ex- 
ceptionally severe ;  snow  covered  the  ground  for  more  than  six 
weeks.  Marie  Antoinette,  who  recalled  the  pleasure  she  had 
taken  in  her  youth  in  sleighing,  wished  to  enjoy  that  amuse- 
ment once  more.  It  was  by  no  means  a  novelty  at  the  court 
of  France :  in  the  stables  at  Versailles  were  found  old  sleighs 
that  had  been  used  by  the  dauphin,  father  of  Louis  XVI. ;  but 
new  ones  were  made,  more  appropriate  to  the  fashions  of  the 
day,  and  the  queen,  accompanied  by  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe, 
both  of  them  charming  in  the  furs  that  enveloped  them,  glided 
over  the  ice  with  the  chief  lords  and  ladies  of  the  court.  She 
hesitated  to  go  to  Paris,  she  said,  "  for  fear  of  being  annoyed  by 
fresh  scandal."  The  first  excursions  were  made  in  the  park  at 
Versailles ;  the  sound  of  the  sleigh-bells  which  ornamented  the 
harness  of  the  horses,  the  elegance  and  whiteness  of  their  plumes, 
the  variety  in  the  form  of  the  various  sleighs,  the  gilt  with  which 
they  were  decorated,  all  combined  to  make  a  charming  spectacle 
for  the  on-looker.  This  success  was  encouraging ;  they  pushed 
on  to  the  Bois  de  Boulogne ;  once  they  went  as  far  as  Paris,  trav- 
ersing the  boulevards  and  some  of  the  streets.  As  the  ground 
was  slippery  and  covered  with  frost,  and  likely  to  occasion  many 
falls,  Marie  Antoinette,  from  kindness  of  heart,  had  desired  not 
to  be  escorted  by  her  guards;  but  the  public,  not  understanding 
her  humanitarian  motive,  and  being  accustomed  to  see  their  sov- 
ereigns surrounded  by  pomp  and  magnificence,  regarded  Marie 
Antoinette's  too  simple  equipage  as  a  crime.  The  queen  knew 
it:  in  the  following  years  she  seldom  went  sleighing;  and  when, 
in  1778,  she  returned  once  to  Paris,  it  was  with  a  numerous  suite, 
in  excellent  order,  and  accompanied  by  the  whole  court  in 
twenty-one  sleighs. 

The  queen  loved  Paris ;  she  loved  its  spectacles,  its  diversions. 
It  pleased  her  to  take  part  in  them  ;  and  the  Parisians,  in  the 
beginning  at  least,  were  delighted  by  her  frequent  appearances, 
as  they  kept  the  actors  on  the  alert  and  forced  them  to  perfect 


BALLS    AT   THE    OPERA.  141 

their  art.  The  queen  went  to  the  Colisee  with  Monsieur,  with- 
out diamonds  or  head-dress,  and  allowed  herself  to  be  approached 
by  every  one,  and  the  public  applauded.  She  went  to  the  Palais 
Royal  to  a  fancy-dress  ball  given  by  the  Due  de  Chartres ;  but 
this  time  the  public  complained:  it  was  not  the  custom  for  the 
queen  to  accept  an  invitation  to  a  ball  given  at  the  house  of  the 
Due  d'Orleans.  The  king  had  given  her  permission  to  go,  al- 
though he  would  not  go  himself.  In  particular  the  queen  went 
to  the  balls  at  the  opera.  These  were  then  the  meeting-place 
for  people  of  fashion ;  the  nobles  and  the  ladies  of  the  court  as- 
sembled there  in  domino  and  amused  themselves  by  mystifying 
one  another.  Marie  Antoinette  took  great  pleasure  in  this  her- 
self. "  In  order  not  to  be  known,"  the  Prince  de  Ligne  relates, 
—  "  which  she  always  was,  both  by  us  and  by  all  Frenchmen, 
even  those  who  knew  her  least,  —  she  addressed  herself  to  for- 
eigners, in  order  to  puzzle  them,  hence  a  thousand  adventures 
and  a  thousand  lovers,  English,  Russian,  Swedish,  and  Polish." 

The  queen  never  went  alone  to  these  balls;  she  was  always 
accompanied  either  by  her  suite  or  more  usually  by  the  princes 
or  princesses  of  the  royal  family.  An  officer  of  the  guards  re- 
mained near  her;  one  of  her  ladies  was  by  her  side;  and  if  it 
happened  that  she  walked  for  an  instant  with  a  man,  it  was  always 
with  a  person  of  distinction.  The  king  appeared  but  rarely  at 
these  balls  ;  and  while  he  encouraged  his  wife  to  enjoy  such 
amusements,  he  seldom  took  part  in  them.  On  one  occasion 
Madame,  with  her  Italian  cunning,  pretended  at  the  last  moment 
to  be  indisposed,  in  order  not  to  go  with  her  sister-in-law.  The 
queen  then  went  with  .Monsieur,  and  the  public  cavilled ;  they 
spared  the  young  princess  neither  malicious  criticisms  nor  direct 
reproaches.  On  another,  a  mask  was  bold  enough  to  approach 
her  and  blame  her  laughingly  for  failing  in  her  duty  as  a  good 
wife,  who  should  remain  at  home  with  her  husband  and  not  go  to 
balls  without  him.  The  freedom  of  this  sort  of  entertainment 
gave  rise  to  inconveniences  which  might  have  passed  unnoticed 
in  another  country,  but  which,  Mercy  rightly  declared,  were  to 
be  feared  in  conjunction  with  the  lightness  and  frivolity  of  the 
French. 

One  day  at  the  opera  the  queen  wished  to  go  about  in  the 
crowd ;  in  order  not  to  betray  her  incognito,  she  ordered  the 
chief  of  her  guard  to  follow  her  at  a  distance  of  ten  steps,  and 
she  advanced  with  Monsieur  and  the  Duchesse  de  Luynes.  A 


I42  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

mask  in  a  black  domino  brushed  roughly  against  Monsieur,  who 
pushed  him  aside  with  his  fist.  The  mask  complained  to  a  ser- 
geant, who  was  about  to  arrest  the  prince,  when  the  officer  ex- 
plained who  he  was.  This  incident,  very  simple  in  itself,  gave 
birth  to  the  most  ridiculous  stories.  The  most  ordinary  circum- 
stances were  immediately  travestied,  and  seldom  with  good-will. 

"  The  absurdity  of  the  lies  that  are  told  here  about  everything 
is  beyond  belief,"  Mercy  wrote.  The  persons  who  had  no  other 
means  of  livelihood  but  writing  pamphlets  filled  them  with  a  mass 
of  anecdotes,  invented  at  pleasure  for  the  most  part,  but  which, 
finding  a  semblance  of  truth  in  the  excursions  to  Paris  and  appear- 
ances at  the  balls,  gained  credence  in  the  salons  and  assured  the 
circulation  of  the  leaves  abroad.  The  scandal-mongers  delighted 
in  them ;  and  thus  grew  up  about  the  name  of  Marie  Antoinette 
an  evil  legend,  which,  propagated  by  court  hatred,  nourished  by 
pamphlets,  repeated  in  the  memoirs  of  her  implacable  enemies, 
and  exaggerated  by  party  passion,  has  been  handed  down  to  us, 
and  is  even  yet,  despite  the  clearness  of  the  truth  and  our  knowl- 
edge of  history,  hardly  dissipated,  —  so  difficult  is  it  to  destroy 
calumny  in  France. 

What  has  not  been  said,  for  example,  about  the  adventure  of 
the  cab,  as  it  is  called?  Here  is  the  adventure  in  all  its  sim- 
plicity :  — 

It  was  in  1779,  three  years  after  the  incident  we  have  just  re- 
lated ;  the  queen  still  retained  her  taste  for  the  balls  at  the  opera, 
and  the  king  had  come  to  share  it.  The  two  had  gone  together 
on  the  evening  of  Shrove  Sunday  to  the  ball,  and  after  remaining 
till  morning  in  the  ball-room  without  being  recognized,  had  re- 
turned to  Versailles  alone  together.  They  had  planned  to  return 
to  the  opera  on  the  following  Tuesday.  Then  at  the  last  moment 
the  king  had  changed  his  mind  and  persuaded  the  queen  to  go 
alone  with  one  of  her  ladies  of  honour.  The  queen  consequently 
set  out  alone  with  the  Princesse  d'Henin.  On  arriving  in  Pa^ris 
she  went  to  the  house  of  her  first  equerry,  the  Due  de  Coigny,  to 
take  a  private  carriage,  which  would  the  better  protect  her  incog- 
nito, and  in  this  equipage  she  proceeded  toward  the  opera.  Un- 
fortunately the  carriage  was  old ;  it  broke  down  at  some  distance 
from  the  opera.  The  queen  descended  with  her  lady  of  honour, 
entered  the  house  of  a  silk  merchant  without  unmasking,  to  wait 
while  some  one  went  in  search  of  another  carriage,  and  when 
none  could  be  found,  got  into  a  cab  which  was  passing,  and  thus 


HER   IMPRUDENCES.  143 

arrived  at  the  opera.  Some  of  her  suite  who  had  gone  on  ahead 
joined  her  and  did  not  leave  her  again  as  long  as  she  remained  at 
the  ball,  where  she  was  not  recognized.  Such  is  the  story  of  the 
cab,  according  to  the  best-informed  witnesses.  The  queen  was 
somewhat  disturbed  by  it,  but  the  king  only  laughed  and  made  it 
a  subject  of  pleasantry ;  the  pamphleteers  alone,  lovers  and  in- 
ventors of  scandal,  contrived  to  turn  it  into  calumny. 

It  is  none  the  less  true  that  these  visits  to  Paris,  these  appear- 
ances at  the  balls  at  the  opera,  were  productive  of  real  inconven- 
ience. The  queen,  strong  in  the  testimony  of  her  conscience  and 
purity  of  her  intentions,  only  saw  therein  an  innocent  pleasure 
and  a  diversion  without  consequence.  Mercy  judged  more  clearly 
when  he  made  some  serious  observations  to  the  young  princess  on 
the  subject  of  these  frivolous  pastimes.  They  were  indeed  but 
insignificant  errors,  but  they  made  an  unfortunate  impression. 
The  queen,  with  her  native  benevolence  and  easy  affability,  talked 
to  every  one ;  and  there  resulted  an  appearance  of  familiarity 
which  somewhat  compromised  her  dignity  and  shocked  the  pub- 
lic, unaccustomed  to  such  behaviour.  One  grew  accustomed 
little  by  little,  even  in  the  most  solemn  functions  and  with  the 
best  intentions,  to  ignore  the  high  rank  of  the  sovereign,  who 
seemed  to  wish  to  forget  it  herself.  Familiarity  killed  respect. 
"  Ever  more  jealous  of  her  sex  than  of  her  rank,"  Rivarol  has 
rightly  said,  "  she  forgot  that  she  was  born  to  live  and  die  upon 
a  real  throne  ;  she  was  too  desirous  of  enjoying  that  fictitious  and 
fleeting  empire  which  beauty  gives  to  ordinary  women,  and 
which  makes  them  queens  of  a  moment." 

We  must  not,  however,  blame  the  queen  alone  for  these  im- 
prudences. Louis  XVI.  should  bear  his  share  of  the  responsi- 
bility, which  was,  perhaps,  greater  than  hers.  Head  of  the  family 
and  of  the  State,  it  was  for  him  to  realize  the  harm  that  these 
visits  to  Paris  might  do  his  wife  ;  it  was  for  him  to  warn  her  of  it, 
and,  if  need  were,  to  forbid  these  diversions,  innocent  in  them- 
selves there  is  no  denying,  but  which  laid  her  open  to  criticism. 
He  did  not  do  so ;  far  from  that,  not  only  did  he  sanction  these 
amusements,  but  he  was  the  first  to  urge  Marie  Antoinette  to 
enjoy  them ;  and  when  Maria  Theresa,  alarmed  for  the  reputa- 
tion of  her  daughter  by  the  rumours  which  arrived  from  Paris, 
echoed  from  Vienna  the  severe  observations  of  Mercy,  and  wrote 
that  these  amusements,  "  wherein  the  dear  queen  appeared  with- 
out her  sisters-in-law  and  the  king,  caused  her  many  anxious  mo- 


144  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

ments,"  the  young  woman  had  the  right  to  reply  that  the  king 
knew  and  approved  of  them,  and  that  she  could  not  do  wrong  in 
yielding  to  the  instances  of  her  husband. 

"  Among  the  rumours  which  are  spread  to  detract  from  the  honour  and 
consideration  essential  to  the  queen  of  France,"  Mercy  wrote  on  Dec.  17, 
1776,  "there  is  one  which  is  more  dangerous  and  more  unfortunate  than 
all  the  others.  It  is  dangerous,  because  from  its  nature  it  must  make  an 
impression  on  all  classes  of  society,  and  particularly  on  the  people  ;  it  is 
unfortunate,  because  after  deducting  all  the  lies  and  exaggerations  insepa- 
rable from  public  rumour,  there  remain  nevertheless  many  very  authentic 
facts  to  which  it  would  have  been  better  if  the  queen  had  never  given  any 
pretext.  The  queen  is  censured  quite  publicly  for  making  and  being  the 
occasion  of  considerable  expenditures.  This  cry  will  continue  and  increase 
if  the  queen  does  not  immediately  adopt  some  principle  of  moderation  on 
this  article.  It  only  began  after  the  death  of  the  late  king ;  but  it  has 
already  grown  to  great  dimensions." 

Strange  that  Marie  Antoinette  as  dauphiness  had  never  shown 
any  taste  for  extravagance  !  She  had  even  seemed  rather  to  lean 
toward  a  somewhat  strict  economy.  "  There  is  no  instance,"  the 
ambassador  wrote,  "  when  Madame  the  Dauphiness  has  of  her 
own  accord  exhibited  any  marked  liberality."  A  year  later  he 
again  observes  with  chagrin  that  "  Madame  the  Archduchess  has 
never  given  any  indication  of  a  disposition  toward  generosity," 
and  he  asks  himself,  not  without  uneasiness,  to  what  use  he  can 
put  the  thousand  louis  which  the  empress  had  authorized  him  to 
put  at  the  disposition  of  her  daughter.  When  she  ascended  the 
throne,  Marie  Antoinette  could  with  justice  boast  of  never  having 
made  any  debts.  At  the  beginning  of  her  reign  she  had  shown 
herself  resolute  to  avoid  all  useless  and  superfluous  expense,  and 
she  had  given  up  without  regret  amusements  which  were  likely 
to  become  expensive  and  embarrassing.  Soon,  however,  dazzled 
by  her  new  grandeur,  and  led  on  by  her  friends,  she  threw  her- 
self into  the  vortex  of  pleasures  and  luxury.  As  dauphiness  she 
had  spent  little  on  her  dress ;  and  though  she  loved  jewels,  we 
have  seen  her  refuse  the  diamond  ear-rings  which  Madame  du 
Barry  offered  to  persuade  Louis  XV.  to  buy  for  her.  Once  upon 
the  throne,  her  taste  for  stones  asserted  itself  forcibly  and  irresis- 
tibly. In  January,  1776,  she  bought  some  girandoles  worth  four 
hundred  thousand  francs,  and  it  was  necessary  to  ask  the  mer- 
chant for  a  delay  of  four  years  to  pay  the  full  price.  Six  months 
later  she  bought  bracelets  at  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand 


HER   JEWELS;    HER    PLAY.  145 

livres.  "This  purchase,"  Mercy  said,  "was  determined  upon 
because  certain  persons  about  the  queen  tempted  her,  and  because 
of  her  protection  granted  to  certain  jewellers."  But  this  time  her 
purse,  already  drained  by  the  acquisition  of  the  girandoles,  was 
wholly  insufficient.  It  was  necessary  to  meet  the  deficit;  some 
jewels  were  sold ;  then  the  queen  with  extreme  repugnance  de- 
cided to  demand  two  thousand  louis  from  her  husband.  The 
king  made  some  remarks,  but  gave  her  the  sum.  Maria  Theresa 
was  less  patient ;  she  addressed  some  lively  reproaches  to  her 
daughter. 

"  These  anecdotes  cut  me  to  the  heart,  above  all,  for  the  future," 
she  wrote  to  her,  in  her  vigorous  and  incorrect  style.  "  That  re- 
lating to  the  diamonds  humiliated  me.  This  French  frivolity  and 
passion  for  all  these  extraordinary  ornaments  !  My  daughter,  my 
dear  daughter,  the  first  queen,  is  she  to  grow  to  be  like  this?  The 
idea  is  insupportable  to  me." 

The  queen  was  piqued  by  these  reproaches.  "  So  my  bracelets 
have  reached  Vienna,"  she  said  angrily,  on  reading  her  mother's 
letter.  "  I  wager  that  this  information  came  from  my  sister  Marie." 
Not  knowing  what  to  reply,  she  affected  to  turn  the  affair  into  a 
jest,  and  treated  the  purchase  of  the  bracelets  as  a  trifle.  The 
empress  replied  warmly.  "  You  pass  very  lightly  over  the  brace- 
lets," she  said,  "  but  the  affair  is  not  such  as  you  wish  to  make  it 
seem.  A  sovereign  lowers  herself  by  decking  herself  out,  and  still 
more  if  she  pushes  it  to  such  considerable  sums,  and  at  such  times! 
I  see  but  too  often  this  spirit  of  dissipation  ;  I  cannot  remain  silent, 
loving  you  for  your  good,  and  not  to  flatter  you." 

Maria  Theresa  was  right;  her  language  was  severe,  but  this 
severity  was  legitimate,  and  her  fears  were  but  too  well  founded. 
Behind  these  excessive  expenditures  we  see  appear  in  the  future, 
like  a  threatening  phantom,  the  law-suit  of  the  necklace. 

After  the  purchase  of  the  diamonds  came  her  play.  Here  also 
the  queen  suffered  herself  to  be  led  on.  As  dauphiness  she  had 
exhibited  a  sufficiently  strong  repugnance  to  this  kind  of  amuse- 
ment. Even  as  queen,  she  had  for  a  long  time  refused  to  play. 
Then  the  taste  was  born  in  the  companionship  of  her  favourites, 
and  by  the  example  of  the  Comte  d'Artois,  and  soon  grew  to  be 
very  lively.  "Her  play  has 'become  very  dear,"  Mercy  wrote : 
"  she  no  longer  plays  games  of  commerce,  in  which  the  losses  are 
necessarily  limited ;  lansquenet  has  become  her  ordinary  play, 
and  sometimes  faro.  This  play  is  not  entirely  public."  The  king 
VOL.  i.  — 10 


LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE 


disapproved  of  this  high  play,  but  they  hid  it  from  him.  When 
he  went  to  the  house  of  the  Princesse  de  Guemenee,  they  put 
away  the  cards  a  quarter  of  an  hour  before  his  arrival,  then 
took  them  out  again  after  his  departure.  They  also  played  at  the 
house  of  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe.  Louis  XVI  himself,  with 
his  too  easy  good-nature,  sometimes  lent  himself  to  the  vagaries 
of  the  companions  of  the  queen  ;  he  contented  himself  with  mak- 
ing fun  of  them  rather  than  forbidding  them.  The  public  mur- 
mured, and  the  ladies  of  the  court  complained. 

Once  during  a  sojourn  at  Fontainebleau,  the  queen  was  desir- 
ous of  playing  faro  ;  she  requested  permission  of  her  husband  to 
have  some  bankers  come  from  Paris.  The  king  made  some  objec- 
tions, representing  the  danger  of  authorizing  by  court  example 
games  which  were  forbidden  by  the  ordinances  of  the  police,  even 
at  the  houses  of  princes  of  the  blood  ;  then  he  yielded  and  granted 
the  permission  demanded,  adding  that  it  would  be  of  no  conse- 
quence if  they  only  played  during  one  evening.  The  bankers 
arrived  on  October  30 ;  they  cut  all  that  night,  and  on  the  morn- 
ing of  the  3  tst,  at  the  house  of  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe,  where 
the  queen  remained  until  five  o'clock  in  the  morning,  after  which 
her  Majesty  had  them  cut  again  in  the  evening  and  well  on  into 
the  morning  of  November  I,  All  Saints'  Day.  The  queen  herself 
played  until  nearly  three  o'clock  of  that  morning.  It  was  unfor- 
tunate that  they  should  have  sat  up  so  late  on  the  eve  of  the  sol- 
emn festival,  as  it  occasioned  public  remark.  The  queen  evaded 
the  king's  remonstrances  by  a  jest,  saying  that  as  he  had  given 
permission  for  them  to  have  a  party  of  play,  without  determining 
the  length  of  it,  they  had  therefore  the  right  to  prolong  it  through 
thirty-six  hours.  The  king  laughed,  and  replied  gayly,  "  Go  to  ; 
you  're  no  good,  none  of  you."  He  went  further,  and  carried  his 
weakness  so  far  as  to  have  the  bankers  return  on  November  11. 
Was  it  possible  with  such  condescension  to  check  a  passion  for 
play  which  deranged  the  finances  of  the  queen  and  compromised 
her  credit? 

Let  us  hasten  to  say,  however,  that  in  the  midst  of  these 
excesses  and  of  that  society,  still  infested  by  the  corruption  of 
Louis  XV.,  among  that  youth  somewhat  promiscuous  and  at  times 
enterprising,  whom  such  amusements  attracted  to  Versailles  or  to 
Fontainebleau,  Marie  Antoinette  was  able  always  to  maintain  an 
air  which  commanded  respect  and  restrained  all  liberty  of  speech. 
The  very  ardour  with  which  she  gave  herself  up  to  frivolity  did 


MERCY'S    OPINION    OF    HER   CONDUCT.  147 

not  debase  her  intelligence  nor  the  foundation  of  her  character; 
and  Mercy  remained  convinced  that  both  the  one  and  the  other 
were  naturally  inclined  to  good,  and  would  turn  to  it  from  prefer- 
ence in  all  tranquil  and  thoughtful  moments,  and  that  all  the  great 
qualities  of  the  queen  were  only  held  in  suspense  by  an  inordinate 
dissipation,  while  all  hope  was  not  cut  off  of  a  more  favourable 
return  to  her  interests  and  to  her  honour.  "  To  speak  the  exact 
truth,"  he  said,  "  there  is  less  to  complain  of  in  the  evil  which 
exists  than  in  the  lack  of  all  the  good  that  might  exist." 

An  extraordinary  thing  was  that  this  passion  for  pleasure  did 
not  sensibly  alter  the  basis  of  piety  which  the  queen  owed  to  the 
principles  of  her  mother  and  to  the  instruction  of  her  father;  and 
despite  all  the  errors  which  the  ambassador  did  not  cease  to  point 
out  to  the  empress,  often  with  exaggeration,  Marie  Antoinette 
continued  to  give  to  the  court  an  example  of  regularity  in  her 
religious  practices ;  and  she  often  called  a  halt  in  the  whirl  of 
frivolity  which  we  have  just  described,  but  of  which  we  must  not 
exaggerate  the  character 

Some  historians  have  tried  to  make  use  of  certain  imprudences 
to  asperse  the  young  woman,  and,  above  all,  of  the  so-called  revela- 
tions due  to  the  fatuity  of  certain  men  admitted  to  her  intimacy  ; 
people  have  talked  of  the  loves  of  Marie  Antoinette.  True  history 
has  done  justice  to  these  calumnies.  During  this  period  of  dissi- 
pation, from  the  point  of  view  of  morals  she  committed  no  error. 
"  In  all  that  concerns  morality,  there  has  never  been  in  the  conduct 
of  the  queen  the  slightest  act  which  has  not  borne  the  imprint  of 
a  soul  virtuous,  upright,  inflexible  in  all  the  principles  which  make 
for  honesty  of  character.  .  .  .  No  one  is  more  entirely  convinced 
of  this  fact  than  the  king."  Such  is  the  testimony  which  Mercy 
gives  in  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XVI.,  and  which  all 
his  later  correspondence  confirmed  ;  and  such  is  the  opinion  ex- 
pressed later  by  a  brother,  Joseph  II.,  who  was  severe  and  ill-dis- 
posed toward  the  queen,  after  having  observed  her  closely  and  with 
a  rigour  that  was  almost  malevolent.  And  after  having  scru 
pulously  studied  the  reports  of  the  ambassador,  of  that  faithful 
servitor  and  conscientious  witness,  who  relates  all,  who  even  ex- 
aggerates the  picture  in  order  to  provoke  lively  remonstrances  on 
the  part  of  the  empress  and  serious  reflections  on  the  part  of  the 
queen,  who  hides  none  of  her  imprudences,  and  who  would  not 
have  hidden  her  errors,  if  there  had  been  any,  but  who  did  not 
discover  one  to  point  out  to  the  solicitude  of  Maria  Theresa,  — 


148  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE.  . 

after  having  studied  these  reports,  there  is  no  impartial  historian 
who  will  not  agree  with  the  words  of  Mercy  and  Joseph  II.,  and 
who  will  not  say  with  the  eminent  editor  of  Mercy's  correspond- 
ence, that  "  we  cannot  descend  in  the  future  to  repeating  the 
evil  reports,  the  calumnies,  and  the  vulgar  errors  of  Besenval,  of 
Lauzun,  and  of  Soulavie;"  not  one  who  will  not  subscribe  to 
these  lines  of  one  of  the  men  who  knew  Marie  Antoinette  best  : 

"  Her  so-called  gallantry  was  never  more  than  a  sentiment  of  profound 
friendship,  perhaps  somewhat  marked,  for  one  or  two  persons,  and  a  general 
coquetry  natural  to  a  woman  and  to  a  queen  desirous  of  pleasing  every  one. 
At  the  very  time  when  her  youth  and  lack  of  experience  might  have  led  us 
to  take  certain  liberties  with  her,  there  was  never  one  of  us  who  had  the 
happiness  of  seeing  her  every  day  who  dared  to  be  guilty  of  the  smallest 
indecorum  :  she  acted  the  queen  without  being  conscious  of  it ,  we  adored 
her  without  thinking  of  loving  her/' 

A  man  who  saw  Marie  Antoinette  as  closely  as  the  Prince  de 
Ligne,  without,  however,  belonging  to  her  set,  and  who  was  with 
her  to  the  end,  the  Baron  d'Aubier,  does  not  differ  from  that 
witty  writer  on  this  point :  — 

"  Had  she  ever  remained  upon  the  throne,"  he  says  in  his  somewhat 
stilted  language,  "  one  could  easily  have  pardoned  her  for  surpassing  every 
one ;  but  having  descended  to  the  salons  of  friendship,  the  best  of  her 
friends,  with  all  the  pretensions  of  a  French  woman,  only  saw  in  her  the 
rival  who  had  snatched  the  sceptre  of  the  salon  from  her.  Antoinette  was 
coquettish,  without  being  gallant ;  but  those  who  would  have  pardoned  her 
being  gallant  to  excess  could  not  pardon  her  for  pleasing  excessively.  The 
coxcombs,  repulsed  with  as  much  dignity  as  indulgence  at  the  first  word 
they  ventured  to  utter,  became  the  champions  of  the  hatred  of  those 
ladies  who  consoled  them,  only  because  Antoinette  was  not  what  they  said 
she  was." 

The  minister  from  Prussia  himself,  the  Count  von  Goltz,  so 
hostile  to  the  queen  and  always  on  the  watch  for  means  to  de- 
stroy her  credit,  and  who  declared  that  with  malice  the  conduct 
of  Marie  Antoinette  might  be  unfavourably  interpreted,  was 
obliged  to  acknowledge  that  no  one  could  designate  any  person 
in  particular,  and  that  there  was  evident  only  a  desire  to  please 
every  one. 

Recently,  again,  a  distinguished  historian,  on  publishing  and 
editing  the  reminiscences  of  his  father,  who  was  still  young  during 
the  reign  of  Louis  XVI.,  but  who  was  a  keen  and  sagacious  ob- 


A    PAGE   FROM    D'HAUSSONVILLE,  149 

server,  and  even  because  of  his  youth  more  likely  to  see  things 
as  they  were,  as  no  one  would  mistrust  him,  has  written  the  fol- 
lowing page,  which  completes  and  confirms  the  judgment  of  the 
Prince  de  Ligne  :  — 

"  I  have  always  heard  my  father  say —  and  his  memory  of  his  youth  was 
very  exact  —  that  the  aspect  of  these  assemblies  at  Trianon  was  most  inno- 
cent ,  that  the  queen  bore  herself  with  grace  and  exquisite  decorum  ,  that 
between  those  women,  most  of  whom  were  so  young,  and  some  most 
beautiful,  and  the  small  number  of  men  admitted  to  their  intimacy,  the 
most  perfect  form  always  reigned.  They  affected  to  emancipate  them, 
selves  from  etiquette  because  the  queen  desired  it.  They  pretended  to 
treat  her  like  any  other  woman,  because  this  was  an  indirect  way  of  pay- 
ing their  court ;  but  the  respect  remained  absolute  beneath  the  assumed 
familiarity,  and  reserve  was  always  evident  beneath  their  feigned  abandon. 
The  queen  was  the  only  one  who  was  deceived.  She  congratulated  her- 
self with  entire  good  faith  on  having  introduced  into  the  court  of  France 
the  customs  of  debonair  Austria.  According  to  my  father,  in  this  very 
exclusive  circle,  composed  of  the  most  privileged  and  devoted  of  her  inti- 
mates, her  attitude  was  always  that  of  a  wife  careful  of  her  duties,  attached 
to  her  husband,  whose  very  serious  surroundings  inconvenienced  her 
somewhat,  and  who  sought  near  at  hand,  and  with  the  least  risk  possible, 
the  distractions  natural  to  her  age.  Some  men  who  passed  for  being 
agreeable,  and  were  in  the  fashion,  were  little  by  little  introduced  there. 
They  were  well  received  by  the  queen ;  but  no  one  ever  seemed  to  be 
particularly  distinguished  by  her.  Thus,  much  freedom,  not  a  little  giddi- 
ness, perhaps  some  coquetry,  but  a  coquetry  that  was  generally  without 
aim,  no  appearance  of  deceit,  no  shadow  of  intrigue.  So  it  seemed  to 
my  father;  that  is  to  say,  he  never  had  any  faith  in  the  serious  or  frivo- 
lous attachments  which  have  been  attributed  to  the  queen,  Marie  Antoi- 
nette. He  treated  such  stories  as  foolish  or  stupid  ;  and  it  put  him  in  a 
bad  humour  whenever  any  one  appeared  to  believe  in  them." 

This  page  from  Monsieur  d'Haussonville  leads  us  very  naturally 
to  a  study  of  the  real  causes  of  this  period  of  dissipation  which 
we  have  described  in  the  life  of  the  queen.  If  the  young  and 
lively  sovereign  allowed  herself  during  some  years  to  be  carried 
away  by  a  thirst  of  frivolity  and  pleasure,  which  her  true  friends 
sought  too  often  in  vain  to  moderate,  it  is  necessary  to  know  by 
whom  she  was  thus  led  and  why. 


CHAPTER   XIII. 

THE  COMPANIONS  OF  THE  QUEEN.  —  THE  PRINCESSE  DE  LAMBALLE; 
HER  APPOINTMENT  AS  SUPERINTENDENT  OF  THE  HOUSEHOLD  OF 
THE  QUEEN.  —  THE  COMTESSE  DE  DILLON.  —  THE  PRINCESSE  DE 
GUEMENEE.  —  THE  COMTESSE  JULES  DE  POLIGNAC.  —  FAVOURS 
GRANTED  TO  THE  POLIGNAC  FAMILY.  —  THE  POLIGNAC  SET. —  THE 
COMTE  DE  VAUDREUIL.  —  THE  COMTE  D'ADHEMAR.  —  THE  BARON 
DE  BESENVAL.  —  THE  Due  DE  GUINES.  —  THE  Due  DE  LAUZUN. — 
FOREIGNERS.  —  LA  MARCK  —  ESTERHAZY.  —  STEDINGK.  —  FERSEN. 
—  RIVALRY  OF  THE  FAVOURITES,  —  DECLINE  IN  FAVOUR  OF  THE 
PRINCESSE  DE  LAMBALLE. —  INCREASING  INFLUENCE  OF  MADAME 
DE  POLIGNAC;  DISADVANTAGES  OF  THIS  INFLUENCE. — THE  QUEEN 
CANNOT  RESIST  THE  SOLICITATIONS  OF  HER  FRIENDS.  —  TRUE 
CAUSES  OF  THE  DISSIPATION  OF  MARIE  ANTOINETTE. 

"•  r  I  >HIS  august  princess,"  Mercy  wrote,  "  so  interesting  by 
.L  reason  of  the  exceptional  qualities  of  her  mind  and  char- 
acter, would  be  irreproachable  if  left  to  herself;  it  is  on  her  un- 
worthy surroundings  that  we  must  cast  the  blame,  and  I  shall 
struggle  against  them  to  the  last  moment,  with  the  same  stead- 
fastness I  have  ever  shown." 

It  is  time  to  present  to  our  readers  these  companions  of  the 
queen  whom  the  ambassador  judged  so  severely,  and  who  did  so 
much  harm  to  the  unfortunate  sovereign. 

While  still  only  dauphiness,  Marie  Antoinette  had  noticed  at 
the  balls  of  her  lady  of  honour,  the  Comtesse  de  Noailles,  a 
young  woman  with  large,  tranquil  eyes,  long  curling  hair,  a  bril- 
liant complexion,  an  undulating,  supple  form,  a  sweet  face,  whose 
charm  was  increased  by  an  aureole  of  misfortune.  A  wife  at 
eighteen,  a  widow  at  nineteen,  of  the  unworthy  son  of  the  Due 
de  Penthievre,  Marie  Therese  de  Savoie-Carignan,  Princesse  de 
Lamballe,  had  only  known  the  disillusions  and  sorrows  of  mar- 
ried life.  Hers  was  a  delicate  and  tender  heart,  which  knew  only 
two  attachments,  —  that  to  her  father-in-law,  whose  old  age  she 
sustained,  and  whose  charity  she  shared;  that  to  the  queen,  to 


MADAME    DE    LAMBALLE.  151 

whom  in  the  days  of  trial  she  gave  the  most  decisive  proof  of 
affection,  the  seal  of  blood.  Marie  Antoinette  saw  her,  fell  in 
love  with  her  at  first  sight,  charmed  perhaps  by  the  elegance  of 
her  bearing,  a  veritable  type  of  grace,  — for  the  queen  was  natu- 
rally attracted  toward  everything  that  was  graceful, — charmed 
still  more  perhaps  by  her  limpid  gaze,  the  sensibility  of  her  soul, 
and  a  certain  melancholy  and  dreaminess  that  a  life  already  so 
tried  at  so  young  an  age  had  thrown  round  the  young  Italian, 
fair  as  any  woman  of  the  North.  With  affection  confidence  is 
born,  and  with  confidence  intimacy.  The  accession  of  the  queen 
but  strengthened  these  bonds;  and  in  the  winter  of  1776,  we  find 
the  two  friends  associated  together  in  those  sleigh-rides  which 
at  first  amused  Paris  and  then  aroused  its  murmurs,  —  the  two 
together  mingling  their  freshness  and  their  smiles,  mingling 
in  a  way  their  curls  and  the  sunshine  of  their  gayety;  both  hid- 
ing behind  their  thick  furs  the  suppleness  of  their  figures  and 
the  roses  of  their  faces;  beautiful  and  radiant  "  as  the  spring, 
beneath  marten  and  ermine." 

The  friendship  with  Madame  de  Lamballe  was  the  only  friend- 
ship of  the  dauphiness,  the  chief  and  longest  friendship  of  the 
queen.  During  several  years  her  influence  was  preponderant; 
and  whatever  respect  a  devotion  whose  heroism  was  pushed  to 
martyrdom  may  inspire,  this  influence  was  not  always  for  the 
queen's  good.  Of  a  somewhat  narrow  mind,  an  honest  but  irri- 
table disposition,  Madame  de  Lamballe  more  than  once  threw  the 
court  into  a  rage  and  angered  the  public  by  certain  unwonted 
pretensions,  and  by  her  ambition  either  for  herself  or  her  relatives. 
Her  brother,  the  Prince  de  Carignan,  obtained,  thanks  to  her,  a 
pension  of  thirty  thousand  francs  and  a  regiment  of  infantry,  to 
the  great  displeasure  of  the  minister,  who  was  not  consulted,  and 
to  the  officers  who  aspired  to  the  rank  of  colonel.  She  herself, 
six  months  later,  was  made  superintendent  of  the  household  of 
the  queen,  the  Comtesse  de  Noailles,  whose  husband  had  been 
made  Marechal  de  Mouchy,  having  resigned  under  pretext  of  ac- 
companying her  husband  to  his  new  post  as  governor  of  Guy- 
enne,  but  really  from  jealousy  of  the  increasing  influence  of  the 
favourite.  Marie  Antoinette,  who  saw  without  regret  her  lady  of 
honour  retire,  whom  she  had  never  loved,  hastened  to  profit  by 
her  departure  to  obtain  from  the  king  the  re-establishment  of  the 
office  of  superintendent,  for  the  benefit  of  Madame  de  Lamballe. 
"  Judge  of  my  happiness,"  she  wrote  to  the  Count  von  Rosenberg ; 


152  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

"  I  shall  make  my  friend  happy,  and  I  shall  rejoice  in  it  even 
more  than  she."  But  the  re-establishment  of  an  office  which  had 
been  suppressed  for  more  than  thirty  years  could  not  but  be  the 
cause  of  serious  inconvenience,  at  the  very  moment  when  reforms 
in  the  matter  of  economy  were  being  undertaken.  The  pay  of 
the  superintendent  was  originally  fifteen  thousand  livres,  and 
thirty  thousand  extra  for  the  maintenance  of  a  table  at  court. 
The  last  incumbent,  Madame  de  Bourbon,  had  found  means, 
through  the  influence  of  her  father,  and  on  various  pretexts,  to 
raise  this  figure  to  fifty  thousand  ecus,  equivalent  to  one  hun- 
dred and  fifty  thousand  livres.  The  Princesse  de  Lamballe  claimed 
a  similar  compensation ;  and  Maurepas,  who  saw  therein  a  means 
of  making  himself  agreeable  to  the  queen,  urged  the  king  to  grant 
the  request  of  Madame  de  Lamballe  ;  the  salary  of  the  new 
superintendent  was  fixed  at  fifty  thousand  ecus. 

To  limit  the  prerogatives  of  the  office  which  had  been  re-estab- 
lished presented  no  less  difficulty.  Certain  of  the  privileges  were 
exorbitant.  To  cite  only  one,  no  lady  of  the  queen  could  exe- 
cute an  order  given  by  her  without  first  obtaining  the  consent  of 
the  superintendent.  They  tried  to  reform  this  abuse:  a  new  rule 
was  made  by  the  Abbe  de  Vermond  ;  but  Madame  de  Lamballe 
refused  to  submit  to  it,  alleging  that  her  father-in-law  would  not 
consent  to  have  her  accept  an  office  stripped  of  its  former  privi- 
leges. The  queen  yielded  to  the  solicitation  of  her  friend,  and 
all  her  household  were  incensed.  The  Princesse  de  Chimay  hesi- 
tated to  accept  the  place  of  lady  of  honour,  the  Comtesse  de 
Mailly  that  of  the  lady  of  the  bedchamber,  because  it  seemed  to 
them  that  the  re-establishment  of  the  office  of  superintendent 
would  give  to  their  positions  but  secondary  importance.  Marie 
Antoinette  became  vexed  at  seeing  her  favours  thus  hawked 
about;  she  commanded  Mesdames  de  Chimay  and  de  Mailly 
submitted,  but  their  displeasure  continued. 

The  drawbacks  soon  made  themselves  felt.  The  Princesse  de 
Lamballe,  who  was  very  fond  of  ceremony,  and  the  more  jealous 
of  her  prerogatives  as  she  felt  them  contested,  often  vexed  the 
ladies  of  the  queen;  especially  were  there  continual  disputes  with 
the  lady  of  honour  and  with  the  lady  of  the  bedchamber.  These 
incessant  contentions,  whose  noise  even  reached  the  queen,  fin- 
ished by  annoying  her;  she  was  provoked  with  Madame  de  Lam- 
balle for  being  the  occasion  and  cause  of  these  quarrels,  and  her 
affection  grew  cooler.  She  sought  other  friends.  For  a  while 


MADAME    DE    GUEMEXEE.  153 

her  taste  inclined  to  a  young  woman  of  Irish  origin,  the  Com- 
tesse  de  Dillon  ;  large  and  well-made,  although  somewhat  thin, 
Madame  de  Dillon  had  a  charming  face,  and  a  sympathetic  voice, 
which  seemed  to  reflect  the  sweetness  of  her  soul.  Marie  Antoi- 
nette was  attracted  by  this  sweetness;  but  soon  the  indiscreet 
demands  of  the  new  favourite,  who  was  urged  on  by  an  intriguing 
mother,  Madame  de  Roth,  estranged  the  queen,  and  she  treated 
Madame  de  Dillon  with  only  the  ordinary  kindness  she  showed 
to  all  ladies  of  the  court. 

The  favour  of  the  Princesse  de  Guemenee  was  more  lasting.  By 
her  birth,  she  was  daughter  of  the  Prince  de  Soubise ;  by  her 
office,  she  was  governess  of  the  Children  of  France,  although  the 
queen  was  not  yet  a  mother ;  as  successor  to  her  aunt,  the  Com- 
tesse  de  Marsan,  Madame  de  Guemenee  held  great  state  at  the 
court.  She  gathered  about  her  a  brilliant  society,  and  Marie 
Antoinette  took  pleasure  in  going  to  her  house  to  pass  her  even- 
ings. Mercy  had  in  the  beginning  encouraged  this  intimacy; 
himself  intimate  with  the  princess,  he  could  watch  more  easily  all 
that  passed  at  her  house,  and  he  saw  therein,  moreover,  a  coun- 
terpoise to  the  influence  of  Madame  de  Lamballe.  The  affections 
of  his  royal  pupil  would  make  him  less  uneasy  if  they  were  di- 
vided ;  they  would  lose  in  depth  what  they  gained  in  extent. 
But  the  companionship  of  Madame  de  Guemenee  did  not  offer 
fewer  drawbacks  than  that  of  the  superintendent.  If  what  one 
called  the  Palais  Royal  —  that  is  to  say,  the  Due  de  Chartres  and 
his  following  —  assembled  at  the  house  of  Madame  de  Lamballe, 
the  salon  of  the  governess  of  the  Children  of  France  was  the 
meeting-place  for  all  the  partisans  of  Choiseul.  Her  balls  were 
noisy ;  her  play  unbridled,  and  what  was  worse,  suspicious ;  her 
friends  designing  and  indiscreet.  This  set  was  composed  almost 
exclusively  of  young  men,  accustomed  to  free  conversation,  and 
given  to  a  fault  which  is  very  dangerous  in  personages  of  high 
position,  and  to  which  the  queen  herself  was  somewhat  inclined ; 
namely,  that  of  casting  ridicule  upon  men  and  institutions.  Al- 
though by  her  bearing  she  exacted  respect  from  all  those  who 
surrounded  her,  and  restrained  their  freedom  of  language,  Marie 
Antoinette  felt  the  danger  of  this  intimacy,  and  without  giving 
it  up  completely,  lessened  the  number  of  her  visits  to  the 
governess. 

To  say  the  truth,  it  was  rather  a  thirst  of  pleasure  than  a  liking 
for  the  individual  that  led  the  queen  to  the  house  of  the  daughter 


154  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

of  the  Prince  de  Soubise ;  it  was  policy  which  kept  her  there.  But 
her  heart  alone  ruled  in  a  new  friendship  which  was  more  durable 
than  that  for  Madame  de  Lamballe,  since  it  knew  no  eclipse,  and 
was  as  profound,  since  like  that  it  was  only  broken  by  death,  — 
her  friendship  for  Madame  de  Polignac. 

Married  at  seventeen  to  the  Comte  de  Polignac,  Gabrielle  Yo 
lande  de  Polastron  had  lived  for  a  long  time  at  Claye  in  a  semi- 
retirement  not  altogether  distasteful  to  her,  and  necessitated  by 
the  condition  of  her  fortune.  It  was  only  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
five,  after  the  death  of  Louis  XV.,  that  she  came  to  Versailles, 
whither  her  sister-in-law  drew  her,  the  Comtesse  Diane  de  Po- 
lignac, who  had  been  made  lady-in-waiting  to  the  Comtesse 
d'Artois;  she  appeared  at  the  court,  and  was  immediately  re- 
marked. Her  face  of  a  perfect  oval,  save  for  the  defective  out- 
line and  too  dark  colour  of  the  forehead,  her  angelic  features,  her 
large  blue  eyes,  her  long  brown  hair,  her  charming  mouth,  her 
superb  teeth,  her  well-turned  neck  and  shoulders,  her  medium 
figure,  which,  however,  seemed  taller  than  it  was  in  reality,  gave 
her  an  air  of  grace  rather  than  of  beauty.  A  nose  not  altogether 
straight,  without,  however,  being  retrousse",  a  profound  gaze, 
wherein  was  reflected  a  naive  astonishment,  an  enchanting  smile, 
a  certain  nonchalant  languor  and  careless  attitude  which  recalled 
the  Italian  Morbidezza,  and  a  simplicity  full  of  naturalness,  in 
striking  contrast  to  the  noisy  pretension  of  the  other  ladies  of 
the  court,  added  to  her  mien  something  that  was  both  alluring 
and  piquant.  "  Never  did  face  promise  more  charm  and  sweet- 
ness than  did  that  of  Madame  de  Polignac,"  the  Comte  de  la  Marck 
said ;  "  never  bearing  showed  greater  decorum,  modesty,  and 
reserve."  "  She  had  one  of  those  heads,"  the  Due  de  Levis  said, 
"  such  as  Raphael  painted,  wherein  he  combined  a  spiritual  ex- 
pression and  infinite  sweetness.  Others  might  excite  greater  sur- 
prise and  admiration,  but  one  never  tired  of  looking  at  her." 
She  was  not  a  witty  woman,  nor  was  she  a  learned  woman;  she 
was  a  woman  of  the  world,  who  spoke  little,  was  mistress  of 
herself,  and  showed  a  constant  loyalty  to  her  friends,  hiding  per- 
haps beneath  an  apparent  candour  more  tenacity  and  finesse  than 
appeared. 

Marie  Antoinette  saw  the  Comtesse  Jules  de  Polignac  at  her 
balls,  and  then  was  surprised  to  see  her  no  more.  The  countess 
replied  that  the  smallness  of  her  fortune  did  not  allow  her  to  live 
at  court.  This  naYve  and  clever  avowal  augmented  the  queen's 


FAVOURS   GRANTED   TO   THE   POLIGNACS.  155 

interest :  the  sweet  and  gracious  Madame  de  Polignac  pleased  her; 
poverty-stricken,  she  pleased  her  still  more.  It  seemed  to  the 
queen  that  here  was  an  injustice  of  fate  to  be  repaired.  The  re- 
served bearing,  the  modest  tastes,  the  candour  of  the  young  woman 
attracted  her :  she  thought  she  had  found  what  she  had  so  long 
sought,  —  a  heart  that  would  fully  sympathize  with  her  own,  hating, 
as  she  did,  pomp  and  pretension,  susceptible  alone  to  the  charms 
of  friendship.  She  resolved  to  bind  the  new-comer  to  her  by  the 
most  indissoluble  of  ties,  that  of  benefits,  and  to  enjoy  with  her 
the  supreme  pleasure  which  she  had  dreamed  of,  —  the  calm  and 
simplicity  of  private  existence  in  the  midst  of  the  splendours  of 
public  life.  If  we  may  believe  Madame  Campan,  Madame  de 
Polignac,  on  the  advice  of  her  friends,  had  recourse  to  an  ingeni- 
ous stratagem  to  inflame  and  fix  the  nascent  affection  of  the 
young  sovereign.  A  letter  adroitly  composed,  a  feigned  depart- 
ure, similar  to  that  of  the  nymph  of  Virgil,  who  allowed  herself 
to  be  seen  only  to  take  flight,  a  touching  explanation  throwing 
the  whole  responsibility  of  the  departure  which  afflicted  Marie 
Antoinette  on  the  exigencies  of  her  fortune,  which  did  not  allow 
her  to  afford  the  expenses  of  life  at  Versailles,  were  resorted  to, 
in  order  to  soften  the  heart  of  the  queen,  and  by  assuring  the 
predominance  of  the  countess,  to  retain  the  Polignacs  at  court. 
However  authentic  this  anecdote  may  be,  it  is  certain  that  favours 
of  all  sorts  soon  rained  upon  the  new  favourite.  The  chief  re- 
proach which  history  has  addressed  to  Madame  de  Polignac  is 
that  she  was  lacking  in  disinterestedness,  if  not  for  herself,  at  least 
for  her  family  and  friends. 

Assuredly,  as  the  Comte  de  la  Marck  has  justly  said,  the  high 
position  which  the  countess  soon  held  at  court,  the  entertainments 
which  she  was  obliged  to  give,  the  necessity  of  keeping  a  house 
which  became  for  a  time  that  of  the  queen,  and  where  even  the 
king  himself  sometimes  appeared,  necessitated  expenditures  which 
it  would  have  been  impossible  for  her  to  afford  without  large 
pecuniary  advantages.  A  minister,  an  honest  man  and  one  eco- 
nomical of  the  revenues  of  the  State,  the  comptroller-general, 
D'Ormesson,  has  acknowledged  that  in  view  of  the  great  expense 
to  which  they  were  forced,  the  demands  of  the  Polignacs  were  not 
excessive.  But  when  we  see  them  receive  four  hundred  thousand 
livres  to  pay  their  debts,  eight  hundred  thousand  for  the  dowry  of 
their  daughter,  together  with  the  post  of  captain  of  the  guards  for 
their  future  son-in-law,  the  Due  de  Guiche;  when  we  see  them, 


156  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

not  content  with  such  gifts,  solicit  the  customs  of  the  royal  do- 
main, the  earldom  of  Bitche,  which  was  worth  one  hundred  thou- 
sand livres  a  year,  and  in  default  of  the  earldom  of  Bitche  obtain. 
on  the  2d  of  June,  1782,  the  estate  of  F^nestrange,  which  brought 
in  sixty  or  seventy  thousand  livres,  then  fifteen  months  later 
a  pension  of  eighty  thousand  livres  from  the  royal  treasury, 
and  finally  on  Jan.  I,  1786,  the  general  direction  of  posts  and 
roads,  —  we  begin  to  find  these  favours  excessive,  and  their  pre- 
tensions exorbitant. 

Nor  was  this  all ;  besides  the  pensions  there  were  positions. 
The  Vicomte  de  Polignac,  father  of  Count  Jules,  a  man  of  medio- 
cre capacity,  was  provided  with  one  of  the  most  desirable  offices, 
the  mission  to  Switzerland,  to  the  detriment  of  the  brother  of  the 
minister  for  foreign  affairs,  the  President  de  Vergennes.  The  count 
himself  received  the  reversion  of  the  office  of  first  equerry  to  the 
queen,  with  twelve  thousand  livres'  pension,  and  the  use  of  horses 
and  carriages.  This  was  an  increase  of  nearly  eighty  thousand 
livres  in  the  expenditures,  at  a  time  when  it  had  been  decided  for 
economical  reasons  to  suppress  the  reversions.  It  was,  besides, 
a  deception  and  insult  to  the  then  titulary,  the  Comte  de  Tessy, — 
who,  according  to  custom,  had  the  right  to  present  his  own  suc- 
cessor,—  and  to  the  powerful  family  of  Noailles,  allied  to  Tessy; 
while  the  promise  of  the  office  of  captain  of  the  guards  to  the  Due 
de  Guiche,  son-in-law  of  the  countess,  displeased  the  Cibracs. 

Maurepas,  who,  as  an  old  courtier,  worshipped  the  rising  sun, 
countenanced  out  of  policy  the  demands  of  the  Polignacs.  The 
queen  interested  herself  from  affection ;  and  though  she  often  did 
not  go  so  far  as  Maurepas;  although  on  various  occasions  it  was 
the  minister  who  despite  Marie  Antoinette  forced  the  king's  hand 
for  the  most  exorbitant  of  these  favours,  —  it  was  not  the  minis- 
ter whom  the  public  held  responsible,  but  the  queen.  So  many 
benefits  conferred  on  one  family  (Mercy  claims  that  in  four 
years  the  Polignacs  had  obtained  either  from  large  salaries  or 
other  gifts  nearly  five  hundred  thousand  livres  of  annual  reve- 
nue) displeased  not  only  the  court,  but  the  public.  "  Her  Majesty 
thinks  she  is  sacrificing  to  friendship,"  the  ambassador  wrote ; 
"  and  the  public  only  sees  therein  a  blind  passion  for  the  Comtesse 
de  Polignac." 

If  Madame  de  Polignac  had  been  left  to  herself,  her  influence 
would  not  have  been  dangerous.  Being  sweet  and  indolent,  and 
sincerely  attached  to  Marie  Antoinette,  she  would  have  enjoyed 


VAUDREUIL   AND    D'ADHfiMAR.  157 

without  ulterior  motive  an  affection  which  she  returned,  and  would 
not  have  undertaken  solicitations  which  disturbed  her  tranquillity, 
and  perhaps  cost  her  heart  a  pang;  but  a  set  of  young  men  and 
women  grouped  themselves  about  her,  who  made  use  of  her 
favour  and  took  advantage  of  her  influence.  Among  these  was 
her  own  sister-in-law,  the  Comtesse  Diane  de  Polignac,  who  had 
been  the  instrument  of  her  fortune  by  calling  her  to  the  court; 
a  woman  of  intelligence,  but  designing  and  false,  who,  despite  a 
doubtful  reputation,  succeeded  in  having  herself  appointed  lady 
of  honour  to  Madame  Elisabeth. 

There  was  the  Comte  de  Vaudreuil,  whom  public  malice  accused 
of  being  too  intimate  with  the  favourite,  and  who  exercised  an  ab- 
solute empire  over  her.  He  had  a  good  figure,  elegant  manners, 
was  a  good  musician,  a  patron  of  the  arts,  which  he  cultivated 
himself,  —  one  of  those  rare  men,  who,  according  to  the  saying  of 
Prince  Henry,  "  knew  how  to  talk  to  women,"  but  he  was  easily 
carried  away  by  anger,  going  so  far  one  day  as  to  break  the 
queen's  ivory  billiard-cue  in  a  fit  of  temper  over  a  ball  pocketed 
with  too  great  strength.  Monsieur  de  Vaudreuil  thus  spoiled 
genuine  talents  by  a  violent  and  avaricious  disposition.  Of  an 
absorbing  personality,  and  aspiring  to  have  a  hand  in  everything, 
he  stopped  at  nothing  to  obtain  his  end,  and  his  end  was  usually 
his  own  interest.  Thanks  to  his  influence  over  the  favourite,  it 
was  he  who  made  up  at  will  what  was  called  the  Polignac  set,  and 
who  dispensed  its  offices  and  honours. 

There  was  the  intimate  friend  of  the  Comte  de  Vaudreuil,  the 
Comte  d'Adhemar,  who  was  gifted  with  those  superficial  but 
brilliant  qualities  which  succeed  in  the  world,  —  wit,  a  charming 
face,  and  agreeable  social  talents.  He  sang  correctly,  played 
comedy  well,  composed  pretty  couplets.  Moreover,  he  possessed 
an  ardent  ambition,  audacity,  and  a  great  talent  for  intrigue. 
His  marriage  with  a  widow  who  was  already  old,  but  madly 
in  love  with  him,  —  the  Comtesse  de  Valbelle,  a  lady  of  the 
palace,  —  had  brought  him  money;  the  friendship  of  Madame 
de  Polignac  made  his  political  fortune.  Already  the  French 
minister  to  Brussels,  he  wished  to  be  made  ambassador  to  Con- 
stantinople, then  to  Vienna;  but  Maria  Theresa  opposed  this 
last  appointment,  and  the  queen  refused  to  urge  it.  Defeated 
in  this  scheme,  he  did  not  regard  himself,  however,  as  beaten ; 
having  been  a  subaltern  during  the  Seven  Years'  War,  he  aspired 
to  be  minister  of  war.  Again  Marie  Antoinette  declared  to 


158  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Madame  de  Polignac,  who  was  pleading  her  friend's  cause,  that 
she  must  give  up  an  object  which  for  every  reason  was  an  im- 
possibility. She  did  not,  however,  withdraw  her  favour  from 
Monsieur  d'Adh^mar,  and  three  years  later  he  finally  became 
ambassador  to  London. 

The  Baron  de  Besenval  was  not  less  ambitious  than  the  Comte 
d'Adhemar,  but  his  ambition  was  different.  He  did  not  aspire  to 
be  minister;  he  wished  to  make  ministers.  Thus  he  appears  in 
his  memoirs,  and  such  was  his  real  character,  —  a  fool,  vain,  de- 
signing, caring  much  to  possess  favour,  and  still  more  to  seem 
to  possess  it,  indiscreet,  a  sceptic  with  regard  to  the  disinterest- 
edness of  men  and  the  virtue  of  women,  witty  moreover,  and  to 
a  certain  degree  attractive.  Holding  the  rank  of  lieutenant- 
colonel  of  the  Swiss  Guards,  the  Baron  de  Besenval  was  more 
than  fifty-five  when  he  was  admitted  to  Marie  Antoinette's  set. 
His  air  of  good-nature,  his  affectation  of  simplicity,  his  amiable 
and  often  amusing  conversation,  his  knowledge  of  the  court,  even 
his  political  aspirations,  his  fidelity  to  Choiseul,  whom  he  did  not 
cease  to  exalt,  his  adroit  flatteries,  disguised  under  an  appear- 
ance of  straightforwardness  and  independence,  the  cleverness 
and  eagerness  with  which  he  encouraged  the  secret  inclinations 
of  Marie  Antoinette  and  preached  a  contempt  of  etiquette  and 
the  sweetness  of  private  life,  promptly  won  him  the  sympathies 
of  the  young  sovereign,  whom,  moreover,  his  white  hairs  re- 
assured. She  believed  in  his  merit  and  in  his  devotion,  and  for 
a  time  Besenval  was  the  man  in  fashion,  the  ruler  of  the  Polignac 
set;  he  was  the  originator  of  all  their  plans,  the  leader  of  all 
their  parties.  It  needed  but  little  for  the  queen  to  look  upon 
him  as  a  guide  for  her  youth ;  she  even  allowed  herself  one  day 
to  show  a  confidence  in  him  which  with  his  habitual  presump- 
tion Besenval  hastened  to  abuse.  But  how  could  the  queen  mis- 
trust an  old  man  of  fifty-five,  who  might  have  been  her  father, 
and  whom  she  treated,  as  M?.dame  Campan  has  said,  "  like  a  brave, 
polite  Swiss,  of  no  great  consequence  "  ?  But  a  day  came  when  the 
old  man,  believing  everything  permitted  to  him,  wished  to  make 
use  of  the  confidence  which  the  queen  showed  him  to  wring  from 
her  a  State  secret.  The  queen,  justly  indignant  at  an  insistence 
which  became,  to  use  Mercy's  expression,  "  an  indecent  persecu- 
tion," could  not  help  showing  him  a  marked  coldness ;  without 
banishing  him  completely  from  her  presence,  she  exiled  him  for 
a  time  from  her  intimacy.  Thus  disappointed,  he  avenged  him- 


THE    POLIGNAC   SET.  159 

self  for  his  deserved  disgrace  by  inserting  in  his  posthumous  me- 
moirs libellous  insinuations  which  happily  the  reputation  alone  of 
their  author  is  sufficient  to  discredit. 

Messieurs  de  Vaudreuil,  d'Adhemar,  and  de  Besenval  were  the 
three  principal  leaders  of  the  Polignac  set;  they  were  not,  how- 
ever, alone.  Around  these  ruling  stars  were  grouped  numerous 
satellites,  some  of  whom  hoped  to  rule  in  their  turn.  Among 
these  was  the  Due  de  Guines,  whose  trial  we  have  previously 
described.  Ambitious,  designing,  avaricious,  in  the  midst  of  the 
American  war,  and  despite  the  opposition  of  the  minister  of 
finance,  he  had  found  means  to  obtain  one  hundred  thousand 
£cus  as  a  dowry  for  his  daughter,  and  the  title  of  hereditary  duke 
for  his  son-in-law,  the  Marquis  de  Castries ;  though  a  personage 
of  mediocre  talent,  he  was  able  at  that  epoch,  when  genius  was 
rare,  and  thanks  to  the  support  of  a  restless  and  clamorous  fac- 
tion, to  pass  for  a  while  for  a  statesman,  and  even  aspired  to 
the  office  of  prime  minister.  His  schemes  were  vast,  his  self- 
possession  imperturbable,  his  warmth  in  defending  his  ideas 
catching.  For  a  time  the  queen  was  taken  by  it.  A  letter  from 
Maria  Theresa,  in  confirmation  of  repeated  observations  from 
Mercy,  opened  her  eyes.  She  saw  the  worth  of  her  prot^g^ ; 
and  without  advertising  a  disgrace  which  would  have  seemed  a 
disavowal,  she  treated  him  for  the  future  with  more  coldness. 
The  duke  perceived  it,  and  withdrew  from  the  court. 

Besides  these,  there  were  the  Due  de  Polignac,  "  the  husband 
of  his  wife,"  who,  indeed,  did  not  aspire  to  rule;  and  the  Due  de 
Coigny,  appointed  at  the  end  of  1774  first  equerry  to  the  king, 
and,  like  the  Due  de  Guines,  a  great  partisan  of  Choiseul, —  a 
proud  and  loyal  character,  to  whom  the  queen  was  grateful  for 
having  refused  to  bend  the  knee  before  Madame  du  Barry;  a 
man  of  perfect  good-breeding,  and  of  discretion  beyond  proof, 
but  who  was  avaricious  of  favour  to  the  point  of  taking  umbrage 
at  that  of  Madame  de  Polignac,  and  of  putting  himself  for  a 
moment  in  opposition  to  her.  There  were  also:  the  Marquis  de 
Coigny,  son  of  the  duke;  the  Marquis  de  Conflans,  son  of  the 
Mare"chal  d'Armentieres,  and  brother-in-law  to  the  Marquis  de 
Coigny,  a  determined  Anglomaniac,  one  of  the  most  singular 
characters  of  the  time,  and  one  of  those  rare  courtiers  whom 
the  king  liked,  because  he  was  a  good  rider  and  bold  hunter; 
the  Comte  and  the  Chevalier  de  Coigny,  brothers  of  the  duke,  — 
the  first  a  big,  good-natured  boy,  the  second  a  pretty  man  much 


160  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

admired  by  the  women,  who  called  him  "  Mimi ;  "  the  Bailiff 
of  Crussol,  serious  even  in  his  jesting;  the  Chevalier  de  Lille, 
a  friend  of  the  Coignys,  and  famed  for  his  amiability,  his  wit,  and 
his  facility  in  turning  agreeable  couplets  and  satirical  ballads; 
the  Chevalier  de  Luxembourg,  ambitious  and  wicked,  according 
to  Mercy,  but  whose  favour  was  but  fleeting;  the  Comte  de 
Polastron,  brother  of  Madame  de  Polignac,  an  excellent  vio- 
linist; his  wife,  an  accomplished  beauty,  whose  somewhat  care- 
less grace,  and  languishing  head  carried  on  one  side,  seemed 
made  to  inspire  passion,  and  who  did  in  fact  inspire  it;  the  Com- 
tesse  de  Chalons,  «/<?  D'Andlau,  a  cousin  of  the  favourite,  and  a 
friend  of  the  Due  de  Coigny;  the  daughter  of  Madame  de  Po- 
lignac, the  Duchesse  de  Guiche,  to  whom  Grimm  gallantly 
applied  this  line  of  Horace,  — 

"  Mater  pulchra  fill  a  pulchrior ;  " 

and  the  beautiful  and  spirituelle  Marquise  de  Coigny,  who  did  not 
long  remain  loyal.  Finally,  the  most  brilliant  and  the  most  dan- 
gerous of  all  was  the  impetuous  Due  de  Lauzun,  a  nephew  and 
disciple  of  the  Marechal  de  Richelieu,  — brave  as  his  sword,  chiv- 
alrous as  his  race ;  more  proud  of  his  exploits  in  gallantry  than 
of  his  military  feats ;  intelligent  but  lacking  in  judgment;  a  liber- 
tine and  crippled  with  debts,  whose  greatest  virtue  in  the  eyes 
of  posterity  is  in  having  been  the  husband  of  that  sweet  and 
charming  Ame"lie  de  Boufflers,  who,  in  that  corrupt  society  and 
with  a  husband  so  little  married,  as  he  himself  said,  that  it  was 
not  worth  speaking  of,  preserved  an  irreproachable  and  dignified 
attitude,  and  left  an  untarnished  reputation  for  faithfulness  and 
virtue.  This  Due  de  Lauzun  is  the  same  who  enjoyed  during  a 
time  Marie  Antoinette's  favour,  who  aspired  to  direct  her  and  to 
give  her  advice,  who,  after  having  dared  in  his  incredible  vanity 
to  pose  as  the  queen's  lover  and  offer  her  a  heron's  feather  which 
he  had  worn,  pushed  his  fatuity  so  far  as  to  make  her  a  declara- 
tion, and  who,  thunder-struck  by  her  energetic  "  Go,  Monsieur !  " 
spoken  in  an  indignant  tone,  left  the  palace  with  lowered  head  and 
rage  in  his  heart.  When,  later,  Lauzun  became  the  Due  de  Brion, 
furious  at  this  discomfiture  and  hurt  at  the  constant  coldness  of 
the  queen,  who  had  been  justly  offended,  and  attributing  to  this 
legitimate  anger  the  failure  of  his  aspirations  to  succeed  his  uncle 
as  colonel  of  the  French  Guards,  he  threw  himself,  out  of  ven- 
geance, into  the  Revolution,  and  after  having  been  one  of  the 


FOREIGN    GENTLEMEN   AT    COURT.  l6l 

most  implacable  enemies  of  Marie  Antoinette  during  her  life- 
time, became  after  her  death  the  most  odious  and  untruthful  of 
her  defamers. 

Then,  again,  among  these  great  French  nobles,  but  grouping 
themselves  about  Marie  Antoinette  rather  than  about  Madame 
de  Polignac,  were  the  foreign  gentlemen,  —  valiant  young  men 
who,  fascinated  by  the  irresistible  attraction  which  France  in  the 
eighteenth  ceotury  exercised  over  all  polite  societies,  thronged 
from  all  parts  of  Europe,  to  seek  amusement,  and  many  of  them 
a  career,  in  the  armies  of  the  king  and  at  the  court  of  the  queen. 
Among  them  was  the  Prince  de  Ligne,  one  of  the  most  amiable 
and  witty  men  of  that  time  when  there  were  so  many  amiable  and 
witty  men,  —  one  of  those  who  best  appreciated  Marie  Antoinette, 
and  who,  according  to  his  own  expression,  "  adored  her  without 
thinking  of  loving  her." 

Another  of  these  foreigners  at  the  French  court  was  the  Comte 
de  la  Marck,  Auguste  d'Aremberg,  a  Belgian,  like  the  Prince  de 
Ligne,  belonging,  like  him,  to  one  of  those  princely  families  who 
served  indifferently  France,  the  Empire,  and  Spain;  French  at 
heart,  if  not  by  birth,  he  was  one  of  the  most  respectfully  devoted 
in  the  days  of  good  fortune,  and  one  of  the  most  faithful  in  mis- 
fortune. There  too  was  the  Comte  de  Valentin  Esterhazy,  whose 
favour  alarmed  Mercy  and  displeased  Maria  Theresa,  —  an  honest 
character,  who  did  not  please  by  his  looks,  for  he  was  very  ugly, 
but  by  his  good  qualities,  his  frankness,  his  zeal,  and  his  disinter- 
estedness ;  who  had  the  honour  of  being  one  of  Marie  Antoinette's 
correspondents,  and  the  still  greater  honour  of  being  one  of  her 
most  active  defenders  in  the  hour  of  danger.  In  the  same  group 
was  the  Count  of  Stedingk,  who  owed  to  the  personal  recom- 
mendation of  the  king  of  Sweden,  Gustavus  III.,  his  introduction 
to  the  court  of  France,  and  to  his  brilliant  career  in  America  his 
admission  to  the  suppers  of  the  queen  ,  overwhelmed  by  the 
bounties  of  that  princess,  he  was  not,  however,  ungrateful.  Re- 
called in  1781  by  the  king  of  Sweden,  who  had  just  declared 
war  against  Russia,  Stedingk  left  Versailles  with  keen  regret, 
which  became  even  keener  when  he  was  retained  in  the  service 
of  his  master  on  the  confines  of  Europe  at  the  beginning  of  the 
Revolution,  and  could  not  therefore  fly  to  the  succour  of  that 
queen  whom  he  felt  to  be  menaced  more  than  any  other,  and  of 
that  France  which  he  loved,  as  he  said,  "  enough  to  drown  himself 
for  her." 

VOL.  T.  —  TI 


162  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Finally,  the  most  attractive  of  all  these  figures  was  Fersen,  who 
seldom  frequented  the  salon  of  the  Polignacs,  for  the  reason, 
perhaps,  that  his  chivalrous  nature  revolted  against  the  petty 
intrigues  which  Messieurs  de  Besenval  and  de  Vaudreuil  were 

o 

continually  weaving.  The  Count  Axel  von  Fersen,  of  a  noble 
Swedish  family,  whose  father  was  the  chief  of  the  party  of  the 
Cliapeaux,  or  the  French  faction  in  Stockholm,  had  appeared  at 
Versailles  in  the  spring  of  1774.  Tall,  with  a  distinguished  bear- 
ing, a  handsome  face,  which  was  regular  without  being  expres- 
sive, with  deep  and  somewhat  melancholy  eyes,  of  a  serious 
character,  having,  as  Monsieur  de  Levis  said,  "  more  judgment 
than  wit,"  hiding  a  passionate  soul  under  an  armour  of  ice, 
and  possessing  to  a  supreme  degree  those  qualities  so  rare  at 
court,  —  namely,  an  extreme  circumspection  toward  men  and  a 
rare  reserve  with  women,  —  Fersen  had  attracted  attention  on  his 
first  appearance.  "  It  is  not  possible,"  the  ambassador  from 
Sweden,  the  Count  of  Creutz,  wrote,  "  to  bear  one's  self  more 
wisely  or  decorously  than  he  has  done."  The  dauphiness  had 
admitted  him  to  her  receptions,  and  had  conversed  with  him  at  a 
ball  at  the  opera.  The  friends  of  Gustavus  III.,  Mesdames  de 
Brionne,  de  la  Marck,  and  d'Anville,  had  received  him  with  open 
arms. 

A  second  voyage  in  1778  and  1779  established  his  reputation. 
Received  with  distinction  in  the  principal  salons,  well  treated  by 
the  royal  family,  Fersen  saw  his  favour  increase  to  such  an  extent 
that  the  courtiers  took  umbrage  at  it,  and  calumny  fell  upon  it. 
They  said  that  the  queen  had  an  especial  liking  for  the  young 
Swede ;  that  she  sought  him  out  at  the  balls  at  the  opera,  and  in 
her  more  intimate  assemblies,  and  exchanged  tender  looks  with 
him;  that  she  always  addressed  a  gracious  word  to  him;  that 
she  had  expressed  a  desire  to  see  him  in  his  national  uniform, 
and  that  on  learning  of  his  departure  for  the  war  in  America,  she 
had  not  been  able  to  restrain  her  tears.  The  truth  is  that  Fersen  — 
grateful  for  the  kindly  reception  of  the  queen,  for  her  charming 
attentions,  and  for  her  obliging  remembrance  of  him,  so  com- 
mented upon  by  her  contemporaries,  which  had  made  her  cry  on 
seeing  him  again  in  1778,  "Ah,  here  is  an  old  acquaintance!" 
—  wrote  to  his  father,  "  She  is  the  most  amiable  princess  I  have 
ever  known,"  and  as  a  result  had  conceived  a  respectful  devo- 
tion to  the  sovereign,  heightened  perhaps  by  a  discreet  sentiment 
for  the  woman ;  that  on  her  side  Marie  Antoinette,  having  found 


RIVALRY   OF   THE   FAVOURITES.  163 

in  this  young  man  a  solid  character,  a  delicate  reserve,  and  a  disin- 
terested zeal,  which  she  had  found  but  too  seldom  among  those 
about  her,  had  been  touched  by  it.  To  what  degree?  Fersen 
has  taken  care  to  determine  it  in  the  reply  which  he  made  to  the 
Duchesse  de  Fitz-James  on  his  departure.  "  What,  Monsieur,  you 
are  abandoning  your  conquest?  "  "  If  I  had  made  one,  I  should 
not  abandon  it;  I  depart  free,  and  unfortunately  leave  no  one  to 
regret  me."  The  queen  herself  unconsciously  gave  the  lie  to 
these  injurious  reports,  when  four  years  later  she  warmly  but 
simply  recommended  Fersen  to  the  king  of  Sweden,  publicly 
speaking  his  praise,  instead  of  maintaining  with  regard  to  him, 
as  an  historian  has  said,  a  reserve  which  would  have  been  held  to 
be  significant. 

Some  persons  murmured  at  the  preference  which  Marie  Antoi- 
nette accorded  to  foreigners,  and  the  Comte  de  la  Marck  per- 
mitted himself  one  day  to  say  to  her  that  it  would  do  him  harm 
in  the  eyes  of  Frenchmen.  "  What  can  I  do?  "  she  replied  sadly ; 
"  they  ask  nothing  of  me." 

Such  were  the  principal  members  of  what  was  called  at  first  the 
Polignac  set,  and  later  the  queeh's  set,  when  the  salon  of  the  favour- 
ite had  become  the  salon  of  the  sovereign.  They  composed  an  ex- 
clusive circle  which  permitted  no  division  of  favour,  and  which, 
to  prevent  all  dangerous  intrusion,  tore  to  shreds  all  those  who 
might  aspire  to  rival  them.  "  Altogether,"  wrote  one  of  the  ladies 
of  the  court,  who  did  not  pass,  however,  for  having  an  evil  tongue, 
but  who  had  had  occasion  to  complain  of  their  attacks,  "  this 
famous  set  is  made  up  of  persons  who  are  very  wicked,  and  who 
display  an  incredible  amount  of  arrogance  and  spite.  They  be- 
lieve themselves  made  to  judge  all  the  rest  of  the  world.  .  .  .  They 
are  so  afraid  lest  some  one  should  insinuate  himself  into  favour 
that  they  rarely  praise  any  one,  but  tear  all  to  pieces  at  their 
ease.  Yet  we  must  bear  this  and  say  nothing." 

Madame  de  Lamballe  also  had  her  set.  It  was  composed, 
Mercy  said,  of  somewhat  less  illustrious  conspirators ;  otherwise 
there  was  no  difference.  There  were  to  be  found  there,  in  com- 
pany with  the  Comte  d'Artois  and  the  Due  de  Chartres,  the  fol- 
lowers of  the  Palais  Royal  and  the  House  of  Orleans.  Besides 
these,  the  habitues  of  the  salon  of  Madame  de  Lamballe  were  not 
numerous ;  the  courtiers  had  promptly  perceived  that  the  wind 
did  not  blow  from  that  quarter. 

A  rivalry  was  soon  established  between  the  two  favourites,  and 


164  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  queen  found  herself  beset  with  insinuations  of  all  kinds;  but 
the  issue  of  the  struggle  could  not  be  doubtful.  Nai've  and  timid, 
with  no  resources  of  intellect  to  support  the  graces  of  her  person 
and  the  tenderness  of  her  heart,  and  a  susceptibility  which  was 
easily  wounded,  what  could  Madame  de  Lamballe  do  against 
Madame  de  Polignac,  who  enjoyed  the  advantage  of  being  a 
novelty,  and  who,  besides  her  natural  attractions,  had  the  benefit 
of  the  experience  of  friends  who  had  grown  old  in  their  pro- 
fession? The  countess  complained  gently,  respectfully,  and  ten- 
derly, gave  signs  of  uneasiness  and  chagrin,  and  adroitly  cast 
ridicule  upon  her  rival,  which,  falling  upon  a  mind  naturally 
inclined  to  mockery,  almost  always  produced  its  effect.  Little 
by  little  Marie  Antoinette  came  to  laugh  at  her  first  friend. 
More  open  and  less  clever,  Madame  de  Lamballe  complained 
aloud,  and  sometimes  with  bitterness,  and  her  complaints  annoyed 
the  queen.  Too  great  frankness  and  openness  rarely  please  at 
court;  hints  and  half-lights  are  more  successful.  The  partisans 
of  Madame  de  Polignac  knew  this  well.  They  rarely  attacked 
the  queen  openly;  they  surrounded  her  with  an  almost  imper- 
ceptible network,  in  which  in  the  end  she  found  herself  captive. 
They  profited  by  all  the  mistakes  of  the  superintendent,  exag- 
gerated her  faults,  cried  out  against  her  pretensions,  which  in- 
censed the  court,  against  her  jealousy,  which  admitted  of  no 
rivalry,  and  emphasized  her  timidity,  which  they  called  her 
stupidity.  Little  by  little  the  queen  grew  to  dislike  Madame  de 
Lamballe,  and  without  perceiving  it  herself,  accustomed  herself 
to  do  without  her. 

The  relation  became  strained  between  the  two  friends.  Ma- 
dame de  Lamballe,  displeased,  made  an  excuse  to  dispense  with 
keeping  open  house  ;  it  was  pointed  out  to  her  that  she  should 
give  suppers  at  least  on  the  days  when  there  was  a  ball.  She 
yielded,  but  with  repressed  irritation,  and  as  soon  as  occasion 
again  offered,  sought  another  excuse  for  remaining  aloof.  The 
coldness  of  the  queen  increased  with  what  seemed  to  her  the 
ingratitude  of  her  friend  ;  and  a  day  came  when  Madame  de  Lam- 
balle, feeling  that  she  was  only  tolerated  and  that  she  was  becom- 
ing an  object  of  embarrassment  and  weariness,  decided  to  leave 
the  court,  and  no  one  sought  to  detain  her.  She  retired  to  the 
neighbourhood  of  her  father-in-law,  the  Due  de  Penthievre,  whose 
solitary  life  and  good  deeds  she  shared,  and  but  rarely  appeared 
at  Versailles.  But  if  she  were  lacking  in  intelligence,  her  heart 


INFLUENCE    OF    MADAME    DE    POLIGNAC.  165 

remained  ever  the  same.  Misfortune  freed  her  affection  of  all 
that  had  seemed  to  be  exacting  and  selfish  in  it  during  the  time 
of  prosperity.  In  the  hour  of  danger  she  was  not  found  wanting. 

The  favour  of  Madame  de  Polignac  increased  with  the  decline 
of  her  rival.  Her  star  rose  alone  and  undimmed  on  the  horizon 
of  Versailles.  The  court  flocked  to  her  house ;  and  the  Comte 
d'Artois  himself,  who  had  been  for  some  time  loyal  to  the  super- 
intendent, joined  the  victorious  party.  To  say  the  truth,  the 
Comte  d'Artois  went  wherever  he  could  amuse  himself;  and  the 
assemblies  which  Madame  de  Lamballe  had  refused  to  hold,  and 
which  had  therefore  been  held  at  the  house  of  the  Princesse 
de  Guemenee,  began  to  take  place  in  the  salon  of  Madame  de 
Polignac.  The  queen  fell  into  the  habit  of  going  in  the  evening 
to  her  friend,  and  she  even  succeeded  in  leading  the  king  thither. 
The  court  hastened  to  follow  them  there.  They  assembled  in  a 
large  wooden  hall,  built  at  the  extremity  of  a  wing  of  the  palace, 
which  overlooked  the  orangery.  At  the  end  there  was  a  billiard- 
table  ;  on  the  right  a  piano ;  on  the  left  a  table  of  quinze.  On 
Sunday  there  was  a  mob.  "  Does  Madame  de  Polignac  receive 
all  France?  "  the  Prince  de  Ligne  asked  the  Chevalier  de  Lille. 
"  Yes,"  the  chevalier  wrote  in  reply ;  "  three  days  a  week,  —  Tues- 
days, Wednesdays,  and  Thursdays,  from  morning  to  evening. 
During  these  seventy  hours  there  is  a  general  ballet:  who  will, 
enters  ;  who  will,  sups.  You  should  see  how  the  rabble  of  court- 
iers flock  there.  They  occupy  during  these  three  days,  besides 
the  salon,  always  fuil,  the  greenhouse,  which  has  been  made  into 
a  gallery,  at  the  end  of  which  is  a  billiard-table.  During  the 
four  days  that  are  not  named  above,  the  door  is  only  open  to  us 
privileged  ones." 

The  prestige  of  Madame  de  Polignac  did  not  decrease ;  the 
queen  could  not  do  without  her  friend.  She  was  the  only  person 
of  those  about  her,  Mercy  has  said,  concerning  whom  it  was  im- 
possible for  him  to  open  the  queen's  eyes.  She  showed  her  in 
all  places  and  at  all  times  marked  favour.  In  the  evening  she 
took  her  arm,  traversed  with  her  the  antechamber,  filled  with 
people,  without  other  following  than  a  page  and  two  footmen ; 
and  this  unwonted  familiarity,  the  sign  of  an  affection  without 
precedent,  caused  those  present  to  murmur.  Did  Madame  de 
Polignac  go  to  pass  some  time  in  the  country,  the  queen  wrote 
to  give  her  news  of  Versailles.  Was  she  ill,  the  queen  went  each 
week  to  see  her.  It  happened  that  her  illness  was  but  the  begin- 


166  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

ning  of  her  pregnancy.  It  was  decided  that  at  the  time  of  the  con- 
finement of  the  favourite,  the  court  should  be  established  during 
nine  days  at  La  Muette.  This  time  it  was  not  only  the  court,  but 
Paris  that  thought  such  demonstrations  exorbitant.  Rumour 
spread  that  Madame  de  Polignac  made  an  immoderate  use  of  her 
influence  to  enrich  herself,  as  well  as  all  her  family  ;  and  although 
a  great  deal  of  envy  and  a  certain  amount  of  exaggeration  entered 
into  these  complaints,  the  details  which  we  have  given  above  prove 
that  they  were  not  without  foundation.  To  crown  all  these 
favours,  six  months  after  her  confinement  Madame  de  Polignac 
received  the  honour  of  being  allowed  to  sit  in  the  presence  of  the 
king  and  queen,  and  her  husband  the  title  of  hereditary  duke. 
"  There  are  few  instances,"  Mercy  wrote  concerning  this  last  event, 
"  of  a  favour  which  has  been  so  useful  to  a  family  in  so  short  a 
time." 

The  court  murmured  ;  the  public  was  displeased.  The  queen, 
wholly  given  up  to  her  affection,  saw  neither  the  displeasure  of 
the  court  nor  of  the  public.  The  kindness  of  her  heart,  the  desire 
to  please  those  whom  she  loved,  and  a  strange  timidity  in  so  great 
a  princess,  an  invincible  repugnance  to  say  no,  an  infinite  weakness 
in  yielding  to  the  counsels  of  those  whom  she  believed  to  be 
attached  to  her,  left  her  without  defence  against  the  importunities 
of  her  friends.  It  was  only  necessary  to  insist  with  some  obstinacy 
for  her  to  yield.  Mercy  complained  as  early  as  1772  of  this  re- 
grettable weakness.  "  Those  who  have  sufficient  boldness  to  dare 
to  weary  her  with  their  importunity,"  he  wrote,  "  are  almost  sure 
of  gaining  an  ascendancy  over  her;  and  even  when  she  has  no 
affection  for  them,  and  recognizes  the  injustice  of  their  demands, 
she  often  yields  to  them  solely  out  of  fear."  Age  had  not  cor- 
rected this  unfortunate  disposition  ;  and  what  was  still  more  vexa- 
tious was  that  in  proportion  as  the  queen  was  timid  in  the  face  of 
solicitations,  to  the  same  degree  was  she  importunate  in  her  de- 
mands for  her  friends.  Lively  and  ardent,  she  caught  fire  imme- 
diately on  the  presentation  of  a  request,  without  concerning  herself 
sufficiently  to  consider  its  extent,  and  the  rights  of  the  person  who 
made  it ;  and  when  she  had  once  taken  a  thing  to  heart,  her  in- 
stances were  so  pressing,  the  idea  of  her  power  so  great,  that  not 
only  did  ministers  not  dare  to  refuse,  but  it  chanced  that  they 
sometimes  even  exceeded  her  intentions. 

Madame  de  Polignac,  and  especially  her  friends,  soon  discov- 
ered this  weakness,  and  made  use  of  it  to  their  profit.  If  the 


CAUSES    OF    HER    DISSIPATION.  167 

queen  knew  not  how  to  resist  their  appeals,  she  could  still  less 
resist  their  tears ;  and  it  was  this  last  means  to  which  the  favour- 
ite resorted  when  she  encountered  in  her  royal  friend  a  firmness 
upon  which  she  had  not  counted.  Before  this  supreme  assault 
the  queen  always  capitulated.  It  happened  sometimes  that  she 
grew  impatient;  nor  did  she  deny  the  drawbacks  of  her  surround- 
ings in  her  conversation  with  the  faithful  counsellors  whom  her 
mother  had  placed  near  her.  Her  affection  for  her  friends  did 
not  lessen  her  perspicacity;  with  her  keen  intelligence  and  clear 
judgment  she  saw  their  faults  as  quickly  as  she  was  seduced  by 
their  virtues;  but  their  virtues  made  her  too  easily  ignore  their 
faults,  whose  consequences  she  did  not  sufficiently  calculate. 
"  She  overlooks  everything,"  Mercy  wrote  in  1776,  at  the  time  of 
her  greatest  frivolity, —  "she  overlooks  everything  in  those  who 
can  make  themselves  useful  to  her  in  her  amusements."  She  was 
happy  only  in  those  salons  where  the  subject  of  the  conversation 
was  within  her  comprehension ;  where  all  concerned  themselves 
to  amuse  and  divert  her  ;  where  they  flattered  her  tastes,  and, 
above  all,  her  weaknesses;  where  she  was  indemnified,  as  she 
thought,  for  the  weariness  which  she  endured  during  the  rest  of 
the  day.  If  she  sometimes  withdrew  from  these  companions,  she 
always  returned.  And  thus  the  time  passed  in  vain  if  not  in 
dangerous  conversations,  in  games  of  cards,  in  races,  in  piquant 
and  often  cutting  pleasantries ;  and  there  was  none  left  for  seri- 
ous occupations,  for  reading,  for  reflection,  for  that  travail  of  the 
soul  which  gives  birth  to  great  thoughts,  and  prepares  one  for 
great  deeds. 

Was  it,  then,  only  a  thirst  of  pleasure  which  attracted  Marie 
Antoinette  to  the  society  of  her  favourites,  and  urged  her  to  form 
and  constantly  strengthen  these  ties?  Assuredly  this  motive  was 
present;  there  was  also  that  desire  for  activity  so  natural  in  a 
princess  of  nineteen ;  the  sap  of  her  youth,  which  had  been  held 
in  check  during  the  last  years  of  the  reign  of  Louis  XV.,  when 
it  was  once  free  spread  in  all  its  luxuriance.  But  she  was  also 
urged  by  a  nobler  sentiment,  —  the  need  of  loving  and  being  loved 
for  herself,  a  thirst  of  affection  which  was  not  satisfied  in  her  home- 
life.  The  king  was  kind,  often  thoughtful  toward  his  wife  ;  Mercy 
declared  one  day  that  he  was  in  love  with  her.  But  it  was  with  a 
cold,  timid,  and  embarrassed  love,  which  ill  responded  to  her  heart 
of  twenty,  full  of  fire  and  tenderness.  This  warmth  of  sentiment, 
this  expansiveness,  which  she  did  not  find  in  her  husband,  Marie 


168  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Antoinette  sought  in  her  friends;   and  lacking  love  as  she  under- 
stood it,  she  wished  at  least  for  friendship  in  its  fullest  extent. 

To  this  reason,  besides,  there  was  joined  another  of  a  more 
private  nature.  There  was  in  the  life  of  the  queen  a  sad  void, 
which  filled  her  with  unspeakable  grief.  The  passion  for  amuse- 
ment which  consumed  her  was  often  but  an  extreme  need  of  dis- 
traction, an  irresistible  desire  to  escape  the  weariness  which 
devoured  her.  Her  amusements  were  but  a  veil  thrown  over  a 
grief  which  she  would  not  avow,  and  her  smiles  often  hid  bitter 
tears.  We  know  to-day — the  reports  of  Mercy  establish  it  on 
each  page — the  delicate  situation  in  which  Marie  Antoinette  was 
placed  during  seven  years  by  the  strange  coldness  of  her  hus- 
band. She  wore  the  crown  of  France,  but  she  sighed  in  vain  for 
that  crown  of  maternity  which  adds  so  pure  a  radiance  and  so 
noble  a  dignity  to  the  forehead  of  twenty.  This  was  the  most 
subtle  of  dangers  for  a  young  wife,  as  well  as  the  most  poignant 
grief.  The  vigilant  solicitude  of  Maria  Theresa  became  alarmed. 
The  public  blamed  the  queen  for  the  situation  which  was  so  pain- 
ful to  her,  and  for  which  she  was  not  responsible ;  it  could  not 
pardon  her  for  allowing  the  Comtesse  d'Artois  to  outstrip  her  in 
that  mission,  altogether  royal,  of  giving  heirs  to  the  throne. 

"  The  almost  certain  pregnancy  of  the  Comtesse  d'Artois,"  Mercy  wrote, 
"  gives  but  too  many  subjects  for  disagreeable  reflections,  and  I  am  really 
disturbed  for  the  effect  which  it  may  in  the  end  produce  in  the  heart  of 
the  queen.  However  brilliant  her  position  may  be  at  this  moment,  it  will 
never  be  solid  until  this  august  princess  has  given  an  heir  to  the  State. 
Until  that  time,  so  much  to  be  desired,  the  very  advantages  which  the 
queen  enjoys  entail  certain  drawbacks ;  her  influence,  her  power,  disturb 
a  nation  which  is  petulant  and  light,  and  which  fears  to  be  governed  by 
a  princess  who  lacks  the  virtue  of  being  a  mother  in  order  to  be  regarded 
as  a  Frenchwoman." 

This  situation,  which  was  so  perilous  and  so  false,  was  bitterly 
resented  by  Marie  Antoinette  ;  and  it  was  to  distract  herself —  she 
even  owned  it  one  day  to  Mercy  —  that  she  threw  herself  into 
this  vortex  of  amusement.  Finding  neither  in  the  life  at  court, 
nor,  above  all,  in  her  private  life,  the  satisfaction  which  she  had 
dreamed  of.  she  expended  upon  the  friends  of  her  choice  the 
ardent  and  expansive  affection  which  she  missed  in  her  husband, 
and  which  she  could  not  spend  on  the  fair  heads  of  children,  whom 
she  so  dearly  loved.  Such  is  the  true  explanation  of  the  dissipa- 
tion, apparently  inexplicable,  of  Marie  Antoinette  during  the  first 


DEVOTION    TO    HER   CHILDREN.  169 

years  of  her  reign,  and  her  enthusiasm  for  her  favourites.  If 
some  of  this  still  remained  after  the  birth  of  her  first  child,  it  was 
because  one  cannot  break  in  a  day  the  habits  and  friendships  of 
many  years ;  but  in  proportion  as  the  wave  of  maternal  love 
rose  in  her  heart,  her  wasted  hours  gave  place  to  serious  ones, 
the  preoccupation  of  the  education  of  her  children  succeeded  to 
her  desire  for  amusement;  and  the  queen  little  by  little  withdrew 
from  the  salons  of  her  friends,  to  remain  by  the  cradle  of  her 
children,  and  prepared  herself  by  the  joys  of  maternity  for  the 
struggle  and  the  bitterness  of  her  later  ordeal. 


CHAPTER    XIV. 

TRIANON.  —  THE  KING  GIVES  THE  QUEEN  LITTLE  TRIANON.  —  THE 
CHATEAU.  —  THE  GARDENS.  —  THE  EXOTIC  TREES.  —  THE  RIVER.  — 
THE  THEATRE.  —  THE  TEMPLE  OF  LOVE.  —  THE  BELVEDERE.  —  THE 
GROTTO.  —  THE  HAMLET.  —  THE  DAIRY.  — TRAVELLERS'  OPINIONS 
OF  TRIANON.  —  ARTHUR  YOUNG.  —  THE  RUSSIAN  KARAMSINE.  — 
THE  BARONESS  VON  OBERKIRCHE.  — THE  PRINCE  DE  LIGNE.  —  THE 
APARTMENTS:  THE  DINING-ROOM;  THE  LITTLE  SALON;  THE  BATH- 
ROOM; THE  BOUDOIR;  THE  QUEEN'S  CHAMBER.  —  MARIE  ANTOI- 
NETTE AND  THE  ARTS.  —  THE  MARIE  ANTOINETTE  STYLE.  —  THE 
QUEEN'S  APARTMENTS  AT  FONTAINEBLEAU. — LIFE  OF  THE  QUEEN 
AT  TRIANON.  —  ENTERTAINMENTS  IN  HONOUR  OF  ILLUSTRIOUS  VISI- 
TORS. —  MARIE  ANTOINETTE  AND  LITERATURE.  —  Music.  —  GLUCK 
AND  PICCINI. —  GRETRY.  —  SALIERI.  —  THE  THEATRE.  —  THE  QUEEN'S 
COMPANY.  — COMEDY  AT  TRIANON.  — THE  EXPENSES  OF  TRIANON.— 
THE  DISADVANTAGES  OF  TRIANON. 

TO  this  select  and  exclusive  set  which  we  have  just  described, 
a  private  stage  was  necessary.  For  this  young  sovereign,, 
inimical  to  pomp  and  etiquette,  athirst  for  simplicity  and  solitude, 
a  palace  in  harmony  with  her  tastes  was  needed. 

Versailles  was  large ;  Marly  too  cold ;  Fontainebleau  and  Com- 
piegne  too  far.  This  new  abode,  where  the  queen  was  to  be  at 
home  and  herself,  was  to  be  Trianon. 

"  His  Majesty  grows  gallant,"  the  Abbe  Baudeau  wrote,  on 
May  31,  1774:  "  he  said  to  the  queen,  '  You  love  flowers.  Very 
well,  I  have  a  bouquet  to  present  to  you  ;  it  is  Little  Trianon.' " 
It  is  in  these  words  that  a  chronicler  of  the  time  announces  the 
gift  of  Louis  XVI.  to  Marie  Antoinette.  But  we  know  to  day 
that  the  thing  did  not  happen  thus,  and  that  it  was  the  queen, 
who,  desirous  since  a  long  while  of  having  a  country  house  for 
herself,  asked  her  husband  for  Little  Trianon.  But  the  king 
yielded  with  the  best  grace  in  the  world  to  his  wife's  request. 
At  her  first  word,  he  replied  with  true  civility  that  this  country 
house  belonged  to  the  queen,  and  that  he  was  charmed  to  make 
her  a  present  of  it. 


LITTLE    TRIANON. 


Little  Trianon,  begun  in  1753,  and  finished  in  1760  by  the 
architect  Gabriel,  had  been  for  Louis  XV.  what  it  was  to  be  for 
Marie  Antoinette,  —  a  retreat  where  the  sovereign  went  to  forget 
the  pomp  of  Versailles  and  the  intrigues  of  the  court.  It  was  a 
little  square  pavilion  of  the  Corinthian  order,  built  in  the  Italian 
style,  with  a  single  principal  story,  a  basement,  and  a  very  low 
second  story,  five  windows  on  each  side,  which  were  separated 
on  the  front  by  beautiful  columns  with  acanthus  capitals,  and  by 
four  pilasters  of  the  same  order  on  the  other  fagades.  A  simple 
but  elegant  edifice,  situated  in  the  midst  of  a  park,  which  was  to 
serve  both  as  a  school  of  gardening  and  as  a  botanical  garden, 
and  united  as  in  an  open-air  museum  the  various  kinds  of  gar- 
dens then  known,  —  French,  Italian,  and  English.  An  emeritus 
horticulturist,  Claude  Richard,  had  gathered  there,  on  the  order 
of  the  king,  the  most  beautiful  species  of  exotic  trees,  constructed 
greenhouses,  and  laid  out  parterres ;  and  the  old  monarch,  who 
loved  the  physical  sciences,  had  often  gone  there  to  botanize  with 
his  captain  of  the  guards,  the  Due  d'Ayen,  or  to  talk  plants  with 
him  whom  Linnaeus  called  the  cleverest  gardener  of  Europe. 
From  1771  to  1774  his  journeys  to  Trianon  had  been  frequent; 
and  it  was  there,  on  April  26,  1774,  that  the  king  had  experienced 
the  first  symptoms  of  the  disease  which  was  to  carry  him  off. 

Marie  Antoinette  had  not,  like  her  grandfather,  a  taste  for 
natural  history;  but  she  had,  like  him,  and  even  to  a  greater 
degree,  a  taste  for  retirement  and  a  passion  for  the  beautiful. 
Hardly  had  she  taken  possession  of  her  new  domain,  by  a  dinner 
given  to  her  husband  on  June  6,  before  she  began  to  think  of 
transforming  it  and  fashioning  it  to  her  taste.  The  botanical 
garden  interested  her  but  little.  The  French  garden  did  not 
please  her:  its  long  straight  vistas,  its  avenues  laid  out  by  line, 
its  trimmed  trees,  reminded  her  always  of  Versailles  and  of 
etiquette.  The  English  garden,  with  its  imitation  of  nature, 
its  trees  growing  without  constraint,  its  harmonious  curves,  its 
meadows,  its  charm  of  the  unexpected,  pleased  her  better ;  it 
seemed  to  her  the  symbol  of  liberty,  which  she  had  come  to 
Trianon  in  search  of.  It  was,  moreover,  the  fashion  of  the 
moment:  Horace  Walpole  in  England,  the  Prince  de  Ligne  in 
Belgium,  in  France  certain  rich  financiers,  or  great  personages, — 
Boutin  at  Tivoli,  Laborde  at  Mereville,  the  Due  d'Orleans  at  Mon- 
ceau,  Monsieur  de  Girardin  at  Ermenonville,  —  had  made  Eng- 
lish parks  of  universal  reputation ;  the  queen  wished  to  have  hers 


172  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE 

at  Trianon.  The  botanical  garden  was  sacrificed  ;  the  plants  and 
herbs  were  transported  to  the  Jardin  du  Roi;  and  the  space  re- 
mained free  for  the  new  creation  of  the  young  sovereign.  Her 
Lenotre  was  a  noble,  a  distinguished  amateur  and  clever  de- 
signer, the  Marquis  de  Caraman.  The  queen  went  on  July  23, 
1774,  to  visit  the  garden  of  the  Hotel  Caraman  in  the  Rue  St. 
Dominique;  she  remained  there  an  hour  and  a  half,  found  it 
charming,  herself  charmed  every  one,  and  begged  the  happy 
proprietor  for  his  counsel  for  Trianon.  Under  his  direction  the 
architect  Mique  made  the  plan;  Antoine  Richard,  son  and  suc- 
cessor of  Claude,  carried  it  out.  With  rare  talent  he  made  use 
of  the  riches  already  there,  and  while  forming  new  groupings, 
succeeded  in  preserving  the  most  beautiful  specimens  of  the 
foreign  trees. 

But  the  queen  was  not  content  with  the  plantations  of  Louis 
XV.  ;  each  day  she  had  new  ones  made.  She  increased  her  collec- 
tions ;  she  made  requisitions  from  all  known  countries;  explorers 
from  over  the  sea  were  commissioned  to  bring  her  plants;  eight 
hundred  species  were  gathered  together  in  the  park.  "  The  glory 
of  Little  Trianon,"  Arthur  Young  wrote,  "  are  the  exotic  shrubs 
and  trees.  The  whole  world  has  been  put  under  contribution  to 
ornament  it."  Italy  sent  its  evergreens;  Louisiana  its  taxodi- 
ums ;  Arabia  its  aromatic  firs ;  Virginia  its  robinias ;  China  its 
rose  acacias ;  the  New  World  innumerable  varieties  of  oak  and  nut 
trees.  The  Abbes  Nolet,  Williams,  and  Moreau  de  la  Rochette 
describe  two  hundred  and  thirty-nine  kinds  of  trees  and  shrubs 
which  North  America  alone  furnished  to  Little  Trianon.  Ever- 
greens abounded;  the  queen  desired  verdure  even  in  winter. 
Pines  from  Corsica,  green  oaks  from  Provence,  cypresses  from 
Crete,  arbutus  from  the  Pyrenees,  mingled  their  sombre  foliage 
with  the  warmer  tones  of  the  red  beeches  and  the  lighter  masses 
of  the  sophoras  and  tulips.  Jussieu  made  out  the  list ;  Bonnefoy 
du  Plan  supervised  the  plantation.  The  queen  watched  them  grow 
and  blossom ;  she  had  the  cedar  of  Lebanon,  which  Jussieu  had 
planted,  watered  before  her  eyes ;  and  at  Trianon  the  robinia 
opened  its  perfumed  clusters  for  the  first  time  in  France  before 
her.  Everywhere  and  always  there  were  flowers ;  in  the  spring 
the  lilacs,  the  favourites  of  the  Comte  d'Artois,  who  cultivated 
them  at  Bagatelle,  syringas,  snowballs,  tuberoses.  The  parterres 
were  filled  with  the  most  marvellous  varieties  of  the  iris,  with 
tulips  and  hyacinths  from  Holland.  Then  there  were  the  orange- 


LITTLE    TRIANON.  .  173 

trees,  which  perfumed  the  air  with  their  penetrating  odour,  and  of 
which  the  gardeners  watched  the  blossoms  during  the  night  with 
jealous  care  ;  the  queen  sold  the  harvest  of  them,  —  thirty  pounds 
in  bad  years,  sixty  in  good  ones,  and  seventy-eight  in  1780. 
From  the  first  the  park  had  been  enlarged ;  the  meadow  in  which 
Louis  XV.  had  amused  himself  by  making  experiments  in  culti- 
vating the  land  with  a  plough— which  was  for  a  long  time  pre- 
served—  had  been  added  to  it.  There  the  inequalities  of  ground 
were  imitated:  ravines  were  dug,  hills  were  raised,  great  masses 
of  rock  were  deposited ;  a  river  was  planned,  whose  waters, 
springing  from  a  perpendicular  rock  surmounted  by  a  ruin,  trav- 
ersed the  lawn  in  front  of  the  chateau,  sometimes  visible,  and 
sometimes  hidden  behind  clumps  of  foliage,  only  to  reappear  a 
little  farther  on.  It  was  a  real  river,  this,  although  two  thousand 
fathoms  of  pipe  brought  it  from  Marly,  —  not  a  solemn  and  regular 
sheet  of  water,  as  at  Versailles,  but  a  river  with  its  natural  course, 
its  graceful  meanderings,  its  bed  of  pebbles,  its  harmonious  cas- 
cades, its  murmuring  flow,  crossed  by  real  bridges  of  stone  from 
Vergelay,  or  of  rustic  wood,  like  those  in  Switzerland,  flowing  be- 
tween two  banks  of  turf,  whose  flowered  stretches,  a  traveller  has 
said,  "  seemed  only  to  await  the  apparition  of  a  shepherd." 

In  the  midst  of  these  gardens  rose  charming  edifices,  springing 
from  the  ground  as  if  under  the  wand  of  a  fairy,  —  imitations  of 
ruins,  rustic  houses,  Chinese  pavilions,  a  collection  in  that  little 
corner  of  the  world  of  the  specimens  of  art  and  architecture  of 
all  times  and  countries. 

From  whatever  side  of  the  chateau  one  looked,  the  aspect  was 
different.  To  the  right  of  the  facade  was  the  English  park,  with 
its  clumps  of  trees,  its  sheets  of  water,  its  lawns,  reaching  to  a 
rocky  and  wild  cliff,  planted  with  yews,  with  thuyas,  and  with 
firs.  Before  the  fagade  itself,  toward  the  west,  spreading  out  be- 
neath \\\Q  perron,  and  separated  from  Great  Trianon  by  a  double 
grille,  was  the  French  garden  in  the  style  of  Lenotre,  with  its 
parterres  laid  out  at  right  angles,  its  avenues  of  orange-trees,  its 
bowers,  its  statues  placed  in  niches  of  foliage,  its  vases  filled  with 
rare  flowers,  and  at  the  end  the  pavilion  which  served  as  a  dining- 
room  for  Louis  XV.  And  then  on  the  other  side,  the  theatre, 
built  in  17/8,  with  its  portico  formed  of  two  Ionic  columns;  its 
pediment  strewn  with  instruments  of  music,  in  the  midst  of  which 
reclined  an  infant  Apollo,  holding  a  lyre  in  his  left  hand,  a  crown 
in  his  right ;  its  decorations  in  white  and  gold ;  its  chairs  in  blue 


174  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

velvet;  its  three  tiers  of  galleries  resting  upon  consoles  repre- 
senting the  head  and  skin  of  a  lion,  a  device  of  Louis  XVI. ;  its 
branches  of  oak  and  garlands  of  flowers  held  by  Cupids;  its  ceil- 
ing, whereon  Lagrenee  had  painted  Apollo,  the  Graces,  and 
Thalia  and  Melpomene  ;  its  nymphs,  with  cornucopias,  on  either 
side  of  the  stage  where  the  curtain  was  raised ;  its  groups  of 
women  bearing  torches ;  its  Muses,  who  with  their  softly  rounded 
arms  framed  the  monogram  of  the  queen. 

On  the  third  side  of  the  chateau,  behind,  there  was  still  the 
English  garden,  where  the  river  wound  in  a  thousand  turns  among 
the  poplars  and  maples.  From  the  bosom  of  the  water  rose, 
light  and  graceful  as  a  naiad,  an  island  of  elegant  outline,  and 
upon  the  island  the  most  enchanting  marvel  perhaps  of  that  en- 
chanting Eden,  a  round  temple  of  perfect  proportion,  whose 
Corinthian  colonnade,  delicately  carved,  sheltered  beneath  a  rosette 
of  acanthus  leaves  a  statue  of  love  by  Bouchardon ;  the  god,  in 
all  the  beauty  and  force  of  youth,  was  carving  a  bow  from  the 
club  of  Hercules.  And  farther  on,  the  lake  with  its  gently  graded 
shores,  its  tranquil  ripples,  on  which  glided  the  gilt  gondolas, 
with  their  flcur  de  Us,  and  their  pavilion  in  the  colours  of  the 
queen,  blue  and  white  striped,  that  came  from  the  Port  of  Depart- 
ure bound  for  the  Port  of  Return. 

Each  year  brought  an  addition  to  this  fairy  creation.  In  1776, 
at  a  short  distance  from  the  palace,  the  Chinese  pavilion  was 
built,  and  beneath  the  pavilion  a  roundabout,  which  was  moved 
by  invisible  mechanism  hidden  beneath  the  ground,  and  whose 
riders  sat  astride  of  dragons  and  peacocks,  carved  by  Bocciardh 
In  1778  the  Belvedere  rose  on  the  hill,  among  thickets  of  roses, 
myrtle,  and  jasmine.  Mique  had  made  the  plan  for  it;  the  queen 
went  there  every  morning  to  take  her  breakfast,  served  on  a  table 
of  gray  marble,  that  rested  on  three  feet  of  gilt  bronze.  From 
thence,  through  four  openings  turned  toward  the  four  cardinal 
points,  she  could  view  her  whole  domain  and  the  river,  which, 
springing  from  a  mass  of  wild  rock  near  by,  flowed  lazily 
about  the  base  of  the  pavilion,  as  if  leaving  with  regret  so  en- 
chanting a  site.  Eight  sphinxes  with  female  heads  guarded  the 
entrance ;  above  the  windows  four  groups,  from  the  chisel  of 
Deschamps,  symbolized  the  four  seasons ;  above  the  doors  the 
attributes  of  the  hunt  and  of  gardening,  carved  by  the  same  hand. 
In  the  interior,  the  floor  was  in  white,  blue,  and  rose  marble ;  and 
upon  the  stucco  walls  ran  light  arabesques,  a  graceful  mixture  of 


LITTLE   TRIANON.  175 


smoking  tripods,  quivers,  vases,  and  bouquets  of  flowers.  Here  a 
goldfinch  drank  from  an  onyx  goblet;  there  two  doves  chased 
each  other  ;  beyond,  a  squirrel  was  eating  a  nut,  or  a  canary  was 
escaping  from  a  golden  cage. 

Not  far  from  the  Belvedere,  and  half  hidden  in  a  narrow  ravine 
shaded  by  thick  masses  of  trees,  was  a  grotto  which  was  only 
reached  after  a  thousand  turnings  by  a  sombre  stair  cut  in  the  rock. 
The  rivulet  which  traversed  it  exhaled  a  delicious  freshness ;  the 
light  penetrated  but  dimly  through  a  crack  in  the  roof;  a  bushy 
growth  concealed  it  from  indiscreet  eyes ;  the  moss  which  car- 
peted the  walls  and  ceiling  prevented  the  noises  of  the  outer  world 
from  entering.  It  was  a  place  for  retirement  and  rest  until  the 
day  when  the  queen  was  to  hear  the  first  murmurs  of  October  5. 

And  now  follow  the  river,  pass  the  Temple  of  Love,  push  on 
to  the  lake.  You  will  soon  see  the  favourite  creation  of  the  queen, 
that  which  best  represents  her  individuality,  that  which  sprang 
altogether  from  her  imagination  and  from  her  heart,  — a  work  in 
the  execution  of  which  she  had  two  allies,  her  architect,  Mique, 
and  her  painter,  Hubert  Robert.  There  is  no  longer  solitude  as 
in  the  grotto :  here  is  life,  or  at  least  the  appearance  of  life,  and 
of  practical  and  laborious  life.  Here  is  a  hamlet,  with  eight 
cottages,  each  one  of  which  arranged  as  if  to  house  a  family  of 
peasants,  surrounded  by  a  little  garden  planted  with  vegetables 
and  fruit-trees.  The  roofs  are  thatched,  the  windows  furnished 
with  little  leaded  panes  of  glass ;  the  galleries  are  of  carved  wood, 
over  which  honeysuckle  and  five-leaved  ivy*  climb.  There  are 
barns  to  hold  the  harvest,  wooden  staircases  to  ascend  to  the 
granaries,  wooden  benches  to  sit  upon.  The  queen's  house, 
which  communicates  by  a  gallery  with  the  billiard-house,  is 
naturally  the  most  beautiful  of  them  all.  She  had  vases  of 
faience  from  St.  Clement,  filled  with  flowers,  and  grape  arbours. 
Not  far  off  rose  the  tower  of  Marlborough,  which  received  its 
name  from  an  old  song  hummed  by  Madame  Poitrine,  the  dau- 
phin's nurse,  whose  spiral  staircase,  decorated  with  geraniums 
and  gilliflowers,  was  reflected  in  the  lake. 

The  hamlet  was  complete ;  nothing  was  lacking  that  constitutes 
a  real  hamlet,  —  neither  the  farm,  nor  the  grange,  nor  the  poultry- 
yard,  nor  the  gardener's  house,  nor  that  of  the  guard,  nor  the 
mill  with  its  turning  wheel.  The  queen  and  Hubert  Robert 
thought  of  everything.  Those  historians  of  Marie  Antoinette 
who  have  the  best  described  in  their  playful  style  this  charming 


1-6  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

creation,  wrote :  "  The  queen  and  Hubert  Robert  have  thought 
of  everything,  even  to  painting  the  fissures  in  the  rocks,  the 
cracks  in  the  plaster,  the  bulging  of  the  beams  and  bricks  in  the 
walls,  as  though  time  would  not  ruin  rapidly  enough  the  play- 
things of  a  queen." 

There  was  a  veritable  farmhouse  thatched  with  straw,  and  living 
animals,  beautiful  Swiss  cows,  lambs,  sheep  that  baaed,  pigeons 
that  cooed,  and  hens  that  cackled.  There  was  a  farmer  named 
Valy,  a  guard  named  Vercy,  a  little  boy  who  drove  the  cows,  a 
maid-servant  who  carried  the  milk,  The  dairy  was  built  on  the 
edge  of  the  lake,  which  served  as  refrigerator ;  and  if  the  water 
from  the  lake  was  not  suitable,  they  drew  other  water  from  seven 
fountains,  surmounted  by  figures  of  children  holding  swans  with 
outspread  wings.  The  slabs  were  of  white  marble ;  the  milk  was 
set  on  them  in  vessels  of  porcelain  made  at  the  queen's  factory 
in  moulds  afterwards  broken.  In  the  hamlet,  if  we  may  believe  a 
traveller,  though  his  testimony  seems  untrustworthy,  "  the  king 
was  miller,  the  queen  was  farmer,  and  Monsieur  was  school- 
master." It  was  village  life,  as  one  understood  it  in  the  eighteenth 
century,  such  as  Florian  had  made  fashionable  ;  a  poem  of  Homer, 
an  eclogue  of  Virgil,  annotated  by  a  story  of  Bcrquin,  wherein 
Nausicas,  perfumed  and  powdered,  washed  iinen  bordered  with 
lace,  with  ebony  beetles ;  where  Tietryes  with  red  heels,  crowned 
with  garlands  of  roses,  tended  the  sheep  with  crooks  of  gold. 
"  It  is  a  sheep-fold,"  the  Chevalier  de  Boufflers  said,  "  where 
nothing  is  lacking'  but  the  wolf." 

The  hamlet  was  begun  in  1782,  and  finished  m  1788  Despite 
changes  of  plans  and  obstacles,  it  was  built  quickly;  for  the  queen 
was  eager  in  her  desires.  "  You  know  your  mistress,"  Fontainieu, 
the  guardian  of  the  stock,  wrote  to  the  architect  Mique;  "she 
loves  to  enjoy  things  immediately,"  Then  after  its  completion 
came  a  new  transformation,  for,  to  use  Boufflers's  expression,  "  the 
wolf  entered  the  sheep-fold,"  and  Marie  Antoinette  replied  to  the 
calumny  which  had  already  begun  to  assail  her,  with  charity:  "  In 
this  opera-bouffe  village  she  installed  twelve  poor  families,  whom 
she  supported  out  of  her  savings." 

All  these  creations  of  Trianon  are  delicious.  Nothing  can  give 
any  idea  of  their  charm,  which  has  survived  after  a  hundred  years, 
and  gained  a  shade  of  melancholy  which  is  but  an  attraction  the 
more.  The  reputation  of  these  gardens  became  at  once  universal ; 
poets  sang  of  them ;  lovers  of  the  beautiful  admired  them.  But 


LITTLE   TRIANON.  177 


from  the  first  the  malice  of  the  chroniclers  attacked  the  graceful 
fancy  of  the  sovereign,  and  accused  her  of  having  changed  the 
name  of  her  domain  to  a  German  name.  The  queen  was  indig- 
nant ;  and  to  those  who  had  the  simplicity  or  impudence  to  ask 
permission  to  visit  Little  Vienna,  she  replied  by  a  refusal  that  was 
a  lesson.  To  all  others  Trianon  was  open.  They  thronged  there 
from  all  parts, —  from  Paris,  from  Versailles,  from  the  country,  and 
from  abroad.  No  traveller  passed  through  France  without  wish- 
ing to  visit  these  gardens  of  Armide  ;  there  was  not  one  who  did 
not  leave  them  enraptured.  Arthur  Young,  who  cannot  be  sus- 
pected of  partiality  for  the  works  of  the  ancient  monarchy,  and 
who  examined  everything  with  English  phlegm  and  the  practical 
sense  of  an  agriculturist,  was  in  ecstasy  over  the  luxuriant  vegeta- 
tion and  marvellous  collections.  He  criticised  the  park  as  being 
somewhat  crowded ;  but  he  acknowledged  that  much  of  it  was 
very  pretty  and  well  done,  and  that  the  Temple  of  Love  was 
"truly  elegant." 

More  sensible,  as  they  said  in  those  days,  Karamsine,  the  Rus- 
sian, declared  that  the  gardei  of  Trianon  was  the  most  beautiful 
of  all  English  gardens. 

"I  advance,"  he  said,  "and  I  see  hills,  fields,  meadows,  herds,  a  grotto. 
Fatigued  by  the  splendours  of  art,  I  turn  to  nature ;  I  find  myself,  my  heart, 
my  imagination ;  I  breathe,  inhaling  the  perfumed  air  of  the  evening, 
gazing  at  the  setting  sun.  ...  I  would  like  to  stop  it  in  its  course,  in  order 
to  remain  longer  at  Trianon." 

The  Baroness  von  Oberkirche,  who  accompanied  the  Comtesse 
du  Nord  to  France,  is  not  less  enthusiastic :  — 

"  I  went  early  in  the  morning  to  visit  the  queen's  Little  Trianon.  What 
a  charming  promenade  !  How  delicious  were  the  glades,  perfumed  with 
lilacs  and  peopled  with  nightingales  !  The  weather  was  magnificent ;  the 
air  was  full  of  fragrant  mist ;  butterflies  spread  their  golden  wings  beneath 
the  rays  of  the  spring  sun.  I  have  never  passed  more  delightful  moments 
than  the  three  hours  spent  in  visiting  that  retreat." 

After  these  opinions,  —  that  of  the  somewhat  sceptical  English- 
man, of  the  sentimental  Russian,  and  of  the  Alsatian,  —  do  you 
wish  to  hear  the  judgment  of  a  connoisseur,  of  a  master  in  the 
delicate  art  of  the  decoration  of  gardens?  Here  is  what  the  Prince 
de  Ligne,  the  creator  of  Belceil,  and  one  of  the  frequenters  of 
Trianon,  wrote  in  1781  :  — 
VOL.  i.  — 12 


178  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

"  I  know  nothing  more  beautiful  or  better  executed  than  the  temple  and 
the  pavilion.  The  colonnade  of  the  one  and  the  interior  of  the  other  are 
the  height  of  perfection,  in  taste  and  in  sculpture.  The  rocks  and  the 
waterfalls  will  produce  a  superb  effect  in  a  short  time,  for  I  think  that  the 
trees  will  hasten  to  grow  in  order  to  enhance  the  contrast  of  the  buildings, 
the  water,  and  the  turf.  The  river  is  charming  in  a  little  stretch  of  straight 
line  toward  the  temple  ;  the  rest  of  its  course  is  hidden  or  seen,  as  de- 
sirable. The  clumps  of  trees  are  well  distributed,  and  separate  the  objects 
which  would  otherwise  be  too  near.  There  is  a  perfect  grotto,  well  situated, 
and  exceedingly  natural.  The  hills  are  not  sugar  loaves,  or  ridiculous  am- 
phitheatres. There  is  not  one  that  does  not  look  as  if  it  had  been  there  from 
the  time  of  Pharaoh.  The  beds  of  flowers  are  agreeably  placed.  There 
was  one  which  I  thought  looked  a  little  too  much  like  a  ribbon  ;  it  should, 
I  think,  be  changed.  It  was  the  only  defect  I  noticed,  which  proves  that 
although  Little  Trianon  may  be  made  for  enthusiasts,  it  is  not  enthusi- 
asm which  excites  me.  There  is  nothing  finicky,  sought  after ;  nothing 
bizarre.  All  the  forms  are  agreeable.  Everything  is  in  perfect  and  correct 
taste.  Apparently  the  Graces  have  much  sense,  and  add  this  advantage  to 
those  others  which  make  them  admired." 

In  the  palace  there  was  the  same  elegance,  and  to  use  the  Prince 
de  Ligne's  term,  the  same  correctness.  One  ascended  by  an  ample 
perron,  with  a  double  flight  of  steps,  to  the  terraces,  ornamented 
with  balustrades.  On  passing  the  door,  one  entered  a  vestibule 
where  garlands  of  oak  ran  along  the  walls.  A  head  of  Medusa 
seemed  to  forbid  the  approach  of  those  who  were  disagreeable. 
For  others,  for  the  privileged  ones,  a  vast  staircase  with  stone 
steps  and  a  gilt  hand-rail,  whereon  branches  of  laurel  were  inter- 
twined with  the  monogram  of  the  goddess  of  the  place,  invited 
entrance.  In  the  centre  hung  a  marvellous  lantern,  made  of 
bundles  of  arrows  and  attributes  of  country  life,  lighted  by  twelve 
lights  borne  by  little  satyrs,  seated. 

From  the  antechamber  which  opened  from  the  head  of  the 
staircase  one  passed  into  the  dining-room,  whose  wainscoting,  ad- 
mirably sunk,  offered  on  all  sides  a  succession  of  fine  arabesques, 
quivers,  arrows,  garlands  of  flowers,  branches  of  laurel,  sphinxes, 
baskets  of  fruits;  the  goats  of  Pan,  with  beards  of  ivy  leaves,  up- 
held the  mantel  of  blue  marble.  In  the  middle  of  the  room  was 
the  table  made  by  Loriot  for  Louis  XV.,  which  rose,  already 
served,  through  a  trap-door  in  the  floor,  with  its  four  servants, 
discreet  auxiliaries,  that  took  the  place  of  and  did  away  with 
the  eager  attention  and  the  importunate  gaze  of  valets. 

Beyond  the  dining-room  came  the  small  salon,  decorated  every- 


LITTLE   TRIANON. 


where  with  bunches  of  grapes,  with  masks  of  comedy,  with  guitars 
and  tambourines.  In  the  large  salon  smiling  and  chubby  Cupids 
played  together  at  the  angles  of  the  cornice,  while  on  the  walls 
branches  of  lilies  blossomed  within  wreaths  of  laurel.  The  furni- 
ture was  of  scarlet  silk  with  gold  galon.  From  the  rosette,  so 
delicate  and  so  light  that  its  clusters  of  flowers  and  fruits  seemed 
scarcely  fixed  to  the  ceiling,  was  suspended  a  crystal  chandelier, 
shining  with  a  thousand  lights.  In  the  dressing-room  two  movable 
mirrors,  rising  from  the  floor  at  will,  shut  off  and  masked  the  win- 
dows. Above  was  a  small  library,  built  in  the  entresol  in  1780; 
on  one  side,  the  bath-room,  where  the  water  poured  into  a  tub  of 
white  marble. 

A  little  boudoir,  deliciously  sculptured,  with  smoking  tripods, 
cornucopias,  doves  lighting  in  nests  of  roses,  shields  covered  with 
flenr  de  Us,  monograms  (M.  A.  pierced  by  harmless  arrows  and 
framed  with  daisies),  led  to  the  bedchamber  of  the  queen,  whose 
furniture  in  blue  silk  —  that  colour  so  becoming  to  blondes  —  was 
comfortably  stuffed  with  eider-down,  whose  bed  was  hidden  be- 
neath lace,  whose  curtains  were  held  back  with  satin  bands  fringed 
with  pearls  and  silver.  A  garland  of  forget-me-nots  and  poppies 
encircled  the  ceiling,  and  on  the  mantel  a  clock  bearing  the  Aus- 
trian eagles  and  the  crook  and  hat  of  a  shepherd  marked  the 
happy  hours  of  the  sovereign  of  this  place.  Along  the  walls  were 
some  canvases  of  Pater  and  of  Watteau,  and  two  charming  pictures 
presented  by  Maria  Theresa,  wherein  Wertmiiller  had  represented 
two  scenes  which  recalled  her  daughter's  childhood,  —  the  opera 
and  the  ballet  executed  by  the  archdukes  and  archduchesses  at 
the  marriage  of  Joseph  II.  In  one,  the  sisters  of  the  queen  were 
giving  a  scene  from  an  opera  ;  in  the  other,  she  who  was  then  called 
Madame  Antoine,  dressed  in  a  red  bodice  and  a  skirt  of  white 
satin,  flowered  with  rose  branches,  was  dancing  a  minuet  with  her 
brothers,  Ferdinand  and  Maximilian.  A  contemporary  asserts 
that  there  were  also  at  Trianon,  in  the  bedchamber  of  the  queen, 
several  portraits  of  the  imperial  family,  in  which,  I  know  not 
from  what  lugubrious  fancy,  the  august  personages  had  had  them- 
selves represented  as  monks  digging  their  graves.  Was  this  in 
order  to  introduce  a  serious  thought  in  the  midst  of  so  many 
smiling  fancies,  and  the  image  of  death  amid  those  emblems  of 
pleasure?  Was  it  the  moral  of  the  poem  ? 

Everywhere  else  in  the  palace  life  abounded  ;  everywhere  ap- 
peared those  graceful  attributes  that  symbolized  the  character  of 


I  So  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  queen  during  her  days  of  happiness,  —  simplicity  and  charm. 
It  was  there  that  the  style  which  has  been  called  Louis  XVI.  blos- 
somed in  all  its  perfection,  but  which  we  would  rather  call  the 
style  of  Marie  Antoinette,  for  it  was  she  who  was  the  inspiration 
of  it,  —  an  exquisite  style,  which  has  remained  during  a  century 
the  standard  of  elegance,  and  grace.  It  was  there  that  the  influ- 
ence of  the  queen  on  the  taste  and  art  of  her  time  was  evident. 
It  was  no  longer  the  severe  grandeur  of  Louis  XIV.  nor  the  affected 
decoration  of  Louis  XV. ;  it  was  a  mean  between  these  two,  uniting 
the  purity  of  line  of  the  one  with  the  delicacy  of  decoration  of  the 
other;  solid,  with  an  appearance  of  fragility,  both  graceful  and 
dignified,  harmonious  without  being  affected,  rounded  without 
being  contorted,  comfortable  without  being  voluptuous.  Mytho- 
logical emblems,  attributes  of  art  and  nature,  sylvan  scenes, 
Renaissance  arabesques,  emblems  and  symbols,  flowers,  fruit, 
and  foliage, —  all  united  in  an  ornamentation  which  shines  above 
all  by  the  abundance  and  delicacy  of  its  details.  The  defamers 
of  Marie  Antoinette  have  accused  her  of  remaining  German; 
she  was  never  more  French  than  at  Trianon. 

At  her  call  all  imaginations  were  set  to  work,  all  the  arts  met 
to  conceive  master-pieces.  Deschamps  sculptured  the  pediments 
of  the  Belvedere  and  the  capitals  of  the  Temple.  Feret  and 
Lagrenee  painted  the  ceiling  and  walls  of  the  theatre  and  of 
the  palace ;  Dutemps  and  Leriche  gilded  them.  For  the  queen, 
Gouttiere  —  the  celebrated  Gouttiere,  as  he  was  called  even  during 
his  lifetime  —  chiselled  marvellous  bronzes,  Houdon  cut  marble, 
Clodion  made  his  statuettes.  Under  her  patronage,  Leboeuf 
founded  a  porcelain  factory  in  the  Rue  de  Bondy.  David  Roet- 
gers  designed  furniture  of  such  perfection  that  Louis  XVI.,  the 
economical  Louis  XVI.,  was  tempted  to  buy  a  marqnetric  writ- 
ing-desk for  eighty  thousand  francs.  Rosewood  and  violet-ebony 
were  used  with  panels  and  plaques  of  Sevres ;  the  consoles  and 
tables  were  heaped  with  a  mass  of  rare  and  elegant  objects,  — 
groups  in  pate  tcndre  or  d:ire,  jars  from  China  of  blue  porcelain, 
vases  from  Vienna  in  petrified  wood,  caskets  of  brown  sardonyx 
or  red  jasper,  boxes  of  Japanese  lacquer  or  of  vernis  J\Iartin. 
All  was  gay;  all  was  exquisite. 

It  was  not  only  at  Trianon  that  the  fancies  of  the  young  sov- 
ereign had  free  play,  but  also  at  Fontainebleau.  Nothing  is 
more  graceful  than  the  suite  of  rooms  which  constituted  the 
apartments  of  the  queen  in  the  old  palace  of  the  Valois.  Mercy, 


HER   APARTMENTS    AT   FONTAINEBLEAU.  l8l 

who  saw  them  in  their  freshness,  declared  that  artists  of  all  kinds 
had  exhausted  all  that  magnificence,  research,  and  taste  could 
produce  of  the  most  curious  and  most  agreeable.  All  vied  with 
one  another  in  decorating  them ;  for  the  bedchamber,  Lyons 
sent  a  most  wonderful  silk  covered  with  rustic  attributes,  —  rustic 
pipes,  red  partridges  running  in  the  fields,  goldfinches  singing  on 
branches  of  flowers,  baskets  of  fruit,  and  ruins  of  temples.  The 
architect  Rousseau  directed  the  works ;  Gouttiere  placed  on  the 
chest  of  drawers  charming  decorations  of  bronze,  clusters  of 
grapes,  heads  of  lions,  scrolls  of  all  sorts.  Sevres  added  its 
transparent  medallions.  On  the  bed  two  gilded  genii  supported 
a  crown  above  the  intertwined  monogram  of  Marie  Antoinette. 

In  the  salon,  a  pupil  of  Boucher,  Barthelemy,  painted  music 
and  the  arts.  In  the  bath-room  he  painted  charming  decorations 
on  the  mirrors.  Gay  Cupids,  fresh  and  rosy,  teased  one  another, 
chased  one  another,  tumbling  about,  running  after  butterflies, 
catching  birds,  playing  with  flowers,  and  climbing  up  the  rose- 
bushes. 

But  the  marvel  at  Fontainebleau  was  the  boudoir;  and  Madame 
de  Stael  was  right  when  she  wrote  to  Gustavus  III.  that  the  queen's 
boudoir  in  all  its  details  was  beautiful  beyond  all  that  could  be 
imagined.  There  again  the  decorator  was  Barthelemy.  On 
the  ceiling  he  painted  Flora  surrounded  by  Cupids,  distributing 
a  profusion  of  the  perfumed  products  of  her  rich  parterres.  On 
the  walls  he  lavished  the  most  charming  creations  of  his  brush ; 
it  was  a  mixture  of  Cupids,  animals,  and  flowers,  of  branches  of 
ivy,  and  of  heads  of  lions,  of  crouching  sphinxes  and  wreaths 
of  bluets,  marguerites,  violets,  and  laurel.  Over  the  doors,  Cupid 
held  a  mirror  for  his  mother,  and  groups  of  young  girls  danced 
before  a  satyr,  or  held  by  his  wings  a  love  who  was  seeking  to 
escape.  The  mantel,  in  white  marble,  was  held  by  sheaves  of 
arrows  forming  columns ;  and  on  the  lintel  was  a  wreath  chiselled 
by  Gouttiere,  made  up  of  garlands  of  foliage  and  flowers.  If  we 
may  believe  tradition,  Louis  XVI.  himself  forged  the  fastenings 
for  the  windows,  on  the  mountings  of  which  branches  of  ivy 
climbed ;  Vulcan  this  time  worked  for  Venus.  The  floor  was 
entirely  of  spotted  mahogany,  a  very  rare  wood  then,  which 
to-day  produces  a  sinister  impression  ;  the  red  spots  look  like 
blood-stains. 

But  let  us  return  to  Trianon. 

The    kingdom  of  Marie  Antoinette  was   small ;    about  sixty 


182  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

acres  composed  the  garden.  The  house  was  still  smaller;  it 
was  hardly  twelve  fathoms  long.  In  the  interior,  besides  the 
apartments  of  the  mistress  of  the  place,  which  we  have  just  de- 
scribed, there  only  remained  on  the  second  floor  a  few  low  and 
small  rooms,  which  were  almost  servants'  rooms.  It  was  indeed 
the  house  of  a  philosopher,  which  could  contain  only  a  limited 
number  of  friends,  and  that  was  just  what  the  queen  desired. 
She  had  created  Trianon  to  escape  from  Versailles  and  Marly ; 
she  wished  to  be  alone  there  with  a  few  guests  of  her  choice. 
She  was  no  longer  the  sovereign  of  a  vast  empire,  but  the  pro- 
prietress of  a  small  domain ;  it  was  the  charm  of  private  life  after 
the  fret  of  public  life.  There  she  was  absolute  mistress,  and  also 
chief  justice;  but  her  justice  was  tempered  with  mercy.  "  As  for 
the  man  whom  you  hold  in  prison  for  the  depredation  committed, 
I  beg  you  will  release  him,"  she  wrote  one  day;  "and  since  the 
king  tells  me  that  he  is  my  prisoner,  I  will  pardon  him." 

The  simplicity  she  had  dreamed  of,  the  life  of  the  affections,  to 
which  she  had  aspired  since  her  childhood,  the  country  existence, 
whose  emblems  were  spread  everywhere  about  her,  —  this  was  what 
she  sought  to  realize  at  Trianon.  It  was  there  that  she  could  say 
with  Henry  IV.,  "  I  am  no  longer  queen;  I  am  myself."  In  the 
morning  she  left  Versailles,  accompanied  only  by  a  footman ;  she 
visited  her  garden  and  her  flowers ;  she  gathered  bouquets  of 
roses  and  of  ivy ;  and  when  in  the  evening  she  remained  to  sleep  in 
her  little  chateau,  the  wife  of  the  concierge  served  her  as  waiting- 
woman.  On  Sunday  she  allowed  every  one  who  was  decently 
dressed  to  enter  the  park,  principally  nurse-maids  and  children. 
She  organized  balls  there,  rustic  balls,  sometimes  under  a  tent, 
as  in  a  village,  sometimes  in  the  barn  of  the  hamlet ;  the  queen 
herself  took  part,  dancing  a  contre-danse,  to  put  every  one  at 
ease.  Then  she  called  the  nurse-maids,  had  all  the  children  pre- 
sented to  her,  inquired  about  their  families,  and  overwhelmed  them 
with  bonbons  and  caresses.  She  loved  children  so  dearly,  and 
wished  so  much  to  have  one  herself,  that  at  the  end  of  1776  she 
adopted  a  little  peasant,  whose  happy  face  and  good-humour  had 
struck  her.  She  gave  other  entertainments  there ;  and  one  day 
the  park  was  transformed  into  a  sort  of  fair-ground,  where  the 
ladies  of  the  court  were  the  merchants,  and  where  the  queen  was 
lemonade-girl,  with  theatres,  shows,  and  booths  bordering  the 
avenues.  She  organized  journeys  to  Trianon,  not  such  journeys 
as  those  to  Marly,  which  were  so  expensive  and  so  pompous,  but 


Madame  de  Polignac. 


HER    LIFE   AT   TRIANON.  183 

journeys  when  she  installed  herself  with  a  few  of  her  intimate 
friends  only;  for,  as  we  have  said,  the  house  was  small,  and  did 
not  admit  of  a  large  number.  Madame  Elisabeth  was  always 
there,  then  Madame  de  Polignac  and  her  set,  more  rarely 
Madame  de  Lamballe.  The  king  came  on  foot  without  his  cap- 
tain of  the  guards,  but  never  slept  there.  Monsieur  appeared 
sometimes,  the  Comte  d'Artois  often.  The  guests  arrived  at  two 
o'clock  for  dinner,  and  returned  to  Versailles  before  midnight. 

At  Trianon  there  was  no  ceremony,  no  etiquette,  no  household, 
only  friends.  When  the  queen  entered  the  salon,  the  ladies  did 
not  quit  their  work,  nor  the  men  interrupt  their  game  of  billiards 
or  of  trictrac.  It  was  the  life  of  the  chateau,  with  all  its  agreeable 
liberty,  such  as  Marie  Antoinette  had  always  dreamed,  such  as 
was  practised  in  that  patriarchal  family  of  the  Hapsburgs,  which 
was,  as  Goethe  has  said,  "  Only  the  first  bourgeoise  family  of  the 
empire."  They  all  met  together  for  breakfast,  which  took  the 
place  of  dinner;  afterward  they  played  cards,  chatted,  or  walked, 
and  assembled  again  for  supper,  which  was  served  early.  No 
fine  dressing,  no  complicated  head-dresses,  whose  exaggerated 
height  had  forced  the  architect  to  enlarge  the  dimensions  of  the 
doors,  and  provoked  the  reprimands  of  Maria  Theresa.  A  dress 
of  white  percale,  a  gauze  fichu,  a  straw  hat,  —  such  was  the  toilet 
at  Trianon ;  a  fresh  and  charming  toilet,  which  set  off  admirably 
the  supple  figure  and  brilliant  complexion  of  the  goddess  of  the 
place,  but  whose  extreme  simplicity  enraged  the  manufacturers 
of  silk  at  Lyons,  deserted  for  the  linens  of  Alsace.  There  were 
no  more  noisy  amusements,  no  more  ruinous  faro  that  drained 
the  purse  of  the  queen,  none  of  those  little  games,  a  taste  for 
which  had  been  cultivated  at  the  house  of  the  Duchesse  de  Duras, 
such  as  blind-man's-buff  and  hide-and-seek,  which  had  aroused 
the  ire  of  the  chroniclers.  At  Versailles  and  at  Marly  there  were 
court  amusements ;  at  Trianon  they  enjoyed  the  pleasures  of  the 
country,  —  open-air  balls,  like  those  we  have  just  spoken  of,  a 
dance  on  the  grass,  billiards,  the  roundabout,  and  rides  over 
the  turf. 

The  queen  took  her  role  of  farmer  seriously;  she  had  her 
cows,  Brunette  and  Blanchette,  and  milked  them  herself  in  por- 
celain jars ;  she  had  a  beautiful  white  goat  with  four  horns,  and 
white  lambs  which  had  been  brought  from  Freiburg;  she  had 
her  pigeons  and  her  hens,  which  she  fed ;  she  had  her  parterres, 
which  she  watered.  From  the  dairy  one  passed  to  the  barn,  from 


184  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  barn  to  the  mill ;  one  ate  fresh  eggs  at  the  farm,  and  drank 
warm  milk  at  the  barn  ;  one  fished  in  the  river  or  floated  upon 
the  lake  in  a  gondola,  and  when  tired  of  such  occupation  returned 
to  sit  in  the  shade  and  breathe  the  perfume  of  flowers  while  one 
worked  ;  for  no  one  was  idle  at  Trianon.  The  women  embroi- 
dered, worked  tapestry,  or  plied  their  distaffs  ;  the  men  made  nets, 
read,  or  walked  and  chatted,  —  a  charming  life,  where  time  passed 
without  one's  perceiving  it,  and  where  the  fatigues  and  intrigues 
of  Versailles  were  forgotten ;  a  still  more  charming  life  after 
God  had  granted  the  most  ardent  desires  of  the  queen,  and  the 
aureole  of  maternity  shone  upon  her  head.  For  then  it  was  not 
only  repose  and  friendship  which  she  sought  at  Trianon,  but  the 
health  of  her  children,  who  played  joyously  upon  the  lawns, 
teased  their  lambs,  hunted  nests,  hoed  their  gardens,  breathed  the 
open  air,  developed  in  all  liberty,  and  gained  from  that  liberty 
and  the  open  air  a  vigorous  and  healthy  mien.  After  this 
epoch,  Trianon  became  more  the  vogue  than  ever,  and  there  was 
hardly  a  day  when  the  queen  did  not  go  to  it  from  Versailles, 
either  in  the  morning  or  the  afternoon.  It  was  there  that  she 
went  to  complete  her  convalescence  after  the  severe  and  dramatic 
confinement  at  the  birth  of  Madame  Royale ;  it  was  there  that 
she  watched  the  dauphin  in  the  arms  of  Madame  Poitrine,  —  the 
dauphin,  whose  birth  softened  her  grief  at  the  death  of  Maria 
Theresa,  and  whose  name  the  poets,  with  a  delicate  flattery  that 
went  to  the  heart  of  the  mother,  associated  in  their  praises  of  the 
groves  which  shaded  his  first  steps. 

Such  were  her  private  pleasures  ;  but  besides  these,  there  were 
official  entertainments,  such  as  fall  to  the  lot  of  crowned  heads. 
No  sovereign,  no  great  personage,  came  to  France  without  the 
queen's  desiring  herself  to  do  the  honours  of  her  domain.  Whether 
it  was  Joseph  II.,  the  prince  of  Hesse-Darmstadt,  the  Comte  du 
Nord,  or  the  king  of  Sweden,  there  was  always  an  entertainment 
in  their  honour  at  Trianon.  It  made  in  some  sort  a  part  of  the 
ordinary  programme  of  the  amusements  which  were  offered  to 
foreigners  of  distinction.  Then  there  were  less  noisy  entertain- 
ments, such  as  she  gave  to  the  king,  who  appreciated  them 
greatly;  for  he  loved  ceremony  and  pomp  no  better  than  his 
wife.  Trianon  for  him,  as  for  the  queen,  meant  simplicity,  and 
also  economy  in  comparison  with  Fontainebleau  and  Marly. 
Sometimes  a  few  nobles  were  invited,  or  a  few  ladies  of  the  court, 
like  Madame  la  Marechale  de  Noailles,  the  Duchesse  de  Cosse, 


HER  PATRONAGE  OF  AUTHORS.         185 

the  Marquise  de  Sab  ran,  often  even  ladies  from  Paris.  The  ave- 
nues were  then  illuminated  with  those  coloured  lanterns  which 
gave  so  soft  a  light  and  so  delicate  a  shadow  that,  as  an  eye- 
witness has  said,  "  the  water,  the  trees,  and  the  people  all  seemed 
ethereal." 

After  the  illumination  there  was  supper,  spectacle,  ballet,  or 
walks  in  the  garden,  which  were  prolonged  often  quite  late  into 
the  night.  But  what  made  these  assemblies  most  attractive  was 
the  affability  of  the  queen.  She  exerted  her  ingenuity  to  show 
her  guests  attention ;  and  each  one  departed  enchanted  with  the 
place  and  its  delights,  and  still  more  with  the  kindness  and  gra- 
ciousness  of  the  proprietress.  Mercy  himself,  who  had  looked 
with  distrust  on  certain  innovations  introduced  at  these  entertain- 
ments, acknowledged  that  they  were  charming  by  reason  of  the 
amiability  of  the  queen.  "  Provided  that  they  do  not  become 
too  frequent  or  too  expensive,"  he  added,  "  they  can  only  aid  in 
establishing  good  form  at  the  court,  and  a  species  of  amusement 
which  is  fitting." 

Nor  were  there  walks  only  at  Trianon ;  one  talked  and  read. 
Although  Madame  Campan  has  asserted  that  Marie  Antoinette 
did  little  for  literature  and  the  arts,  it  is  certain  that  she  had  a 
taste  for  intellectual  pleasures,  and  that  it  gave  her  pleasure  to 
encourage  authors.  She  extended  her  protection  to  La  Harpe, 
and  had  him  given  a  pension  of  twelve  hundred  livres;  she  pat- 
ronized De  Lille,  and  out  of  gratitude  the  poet  sang  of  the  gardens 
of  Trianon  ;  she  laughed  at  the  funny  verses  of  Gresset,  and  made 
a  charming  remark  to  the  painter  Vernet:  "  Monsieur  Vernet,  it 
is  always  you  who  make  the  fair  weather  and  the  rain ;  "  she  ob- 
tained a  gift  of  twelve  hundred  livres  for  the  great-nephew  of 
Corneille,  which  admitted  him  to  the  Comedie  Franchise;  she 
had  printed  at  her  own  expense  at  the  royal  printing-house  a 
magnificent  edition  of  the  favourite  poet  of  her  childhood,  Metas- 
tasio,  and  sent  a  copy  to  the  illustrious  writer.  She  applauded 
the  "  Ecole  des  Peres,"  and  after  the  representation,  commanded 
the  Marechal  de  Duras  to  congratulate  the  author  of  the  drama 
on  the  decent  and  moral  tone  noticeable  in  his  work.  She  had 
Lemercier's  "  Meleager  "  played  at  the  Comedie  Frangaise,  was 
present  at  the  first  representation,  and  desired  the  young  author 
to  sit  by  her  in  her  box,  in  order  the  better  to  enjoy  a  success  of 
which  she  had  no  doubt,  and  which,  in  fact,  did  not  disappoint 
her  expectations.  She  granted  a  pension  to  Chamfort,  and  told 


186  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

him  of  it  in  such  flattering  words  that  the  author  of  "  Mustapha 
and  Zeangir,"  in  his  enthusiasm,  swore  a  very  fleeting  oath  that 
he  should  never  forget  it. 

But  she  could  not  pardon  Voltaire  for  his  attacks  on  the  ancient 
faith  of  France  ;  and  if  she  did  not  go  so  far  as  to  regard  him  as  an 
extravagant,  as  her  mother  did,  she  felt  little  sympathy  for  him. 
When,  in  the  spring  of  1788,  that  philosopher  made  a  visit  to 
Paris  which  was  but  one  long  triumph,  she  refused  to  receive 
him  at  Versailles.  Indifferent  to  what  the  public  might  say,  or 
the  chroniclers  affirm,  and  despite  the  solicitation  of  the  friends 
of  Voltaire,  she  declared  that  she  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  a 
man  whose  morality  had  occasioned  so  many  troubles  and  incon- 
veniences. This  fact  has  been  contested ;  it  is  positive  to-day. 

Her  judgments,  however,  were  not  always  so  inflexible,  nor 
her  liking,  like  her  literary  repugnances,  so  well  founded.  If  one 
day,  on  reading  Florian's  "  Numa  Pompilius,"  she  let  fall  the 
piquant  and  true  expression,  "I  seem  to  be  eating  milk-soup," 
at  other  times  her  opinion  was  not  so  correct,  as  happened  in 
the  case  of  that  play  of  Dorat-Cubieres,  which,  although  found 
charming  when  Mole  read  it  in  the  queen's  boudoir,  was  pro- 
nounced so  bad  on  its  representation  at  Fontainebleau  that  the 
king  for  the  first  time  ordered  the  curtain  to  be  lowered  before 
the  end  of  the  comedy ;  or  in  the  case  of  the  "  Connetable  de  Bour- 
bon "  by  the  Comte  de  Guibert,  which,  despite  royal  protection, 
failed  so  lamentably  at  the  marriage  of  Madame  Clotilde.  But 
the  queen  made  no  pretensions,  and  was  the  first  to  laugh  at 
her  mistakes. 

Among  so  many  amusements,  wherein  was  evident  a  fancy 
often  fickle,  there  was  one  taste  which  was  constant,  —  her  love 
of  music.  Marie  Antoinette  had  manifested  it  from  her  youth. 
As  a  child  she  had  played  with  Mozart,  and  had  received  lessons 
from  Gltick.  As  clauphiness,  on  her  arrival  in  France,  she  had 
studied  the  harpsichord  every  day,  had  given  little  concerts  in  her 
apartment,  had  sung  with  Madame  Clotilde,  and  had  amused 
herself  with  playing  on  the  harp.  As  queen,  in  the  midst  of 
those  diversions  which  her  mother  reproached  her  for,  she  con- 
tinued her  music  lessons  and  her  concerts.  The  lessons  often 
lasted  two  hours,  and  the  concert  of  the  evening  served  as  a  repe- 
tition of  the  morning's  lesson.  Her  progress  was  real,  and  her 
pleasure  so  lively  that  Mercy  feared  it  might  be  prejudicial  to 
more  serious  occupations.  Even  at  Fontainebleau,  which  was  the 


HER   KINDNESS   TO    GLUCK.  187 

scene  of  her  greatest  dissipation,  —  the  young  woman  herself 
avows  it,  —  she  had  two  professors  of  music,  one  for  the  harp  and 
another  for  singing.  At  Paris  she  went  from  preference  to  the 
opera,  and  to  the  Comedie  Italienne ;  and  it  was  also  to  please  her 
that  the  opera  consented  to  bring  the  celebrated  "  Capelmeister," 
Gluck,  from  Vienna. 

Gluck  was  for  Marie  Antoinette  more  than  a  great  composer, 
he  was  the  embodiment  of  a  memory,  of  a  memory  of  her  youth 
and  of  her  country,  and  also  of  a  hope  of  a  reform  in  French  art, 
which  she  found  monotonous.  From  the  start  she  encouraged 
him;  she  took  him  under  her  high  protection;  she  had  his 
"  Iphigenia  in  Aulis "  studied,  and  on  the  day  when  the  piece 
was  finally  given,  on  April  19,  1774,  she  applauded  it  until  it 
looked  as  if  she  wished  to  create  a  cabal.  She  had  a  pension 
of  six  thousand  francs  given  to  the  illustrious  author;  she  pro- 
tected him  against  his  enemies;  she  supported  him  by  her  ap- 
plause, despite  the  coldness  of  the  spectators,  at  the  first 
representation  of  "  Alcestis;  "  and  when  a  hostile  coterie  sent  for 
Piccini,  in  order  to  oppose  him  to  Gluck,  and  when  the  fickle 
public  seemed  to  abandon  the  German  composer  for  the  Italian 
master,  she  took  the  part  of  the  teacher  of  her  youth.  On  his 
arrival,  she  granted  him  entrance  to  her  toilet,  and  so  long 
as  he  remained  there,  did  not  cease  to  talk  to  him  ;  she  ques- 
tioned him  kindly  about  his  work,  and  the  great  musician,  in 
whom  the  malice  of  critics  had  not  shaken  his  own  faith  in  his 
genius,  replied  to  her  with  imperturbable  self-possession,  "  Ma- 
dame, 'Armid '  will  soon  be  finished,  and  will  be  truly  superb." 
Despite  a  first  undecided  reception,  the  public  applause  soon 
justified  the  confidence  of  Gluck  and  the  protection  of  the  queen. 
The  Prince  d'Henin,  he  who  was  called  the  dwarf  of  princes,  per- 
mitted himself  to  interrupt  Gluck  cavalierly  at  the  house  of  Sophie 
Arnould  ;  the  Due  de  Nivernais  took  up  the  gauntlet  in  order  to 
please  his  sovereign,  and  if  the  affair  was  arranged,  it  was  because 
the  prince,  to  whom  Marie  Antoinette  sent  word  that  she  knew 
whence  came  the  insult  and  insinuated  that  he  must  repair  it, 
consented  to  visit  the  composer,  which  visit  was  an  apology. 
When  the  Due  de  Noailles,  who  was  more  talented  and  less  lively 
than  the  Prince  d'Henin,  cried  that  the  "  Electra  "  of  Lemoyne 
was  not  worth  twopence,  since  the  author  was  a  pupil  of  Gluck, 
it  was  the  queen  herself  who  undertook  the  defence  of  teacher 
and  pupil  against  the  old  courtier. 


188  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

When  at  the  end  of  five  years,  the  great  man,  embittered  and 
discouraged  by  the  failure  of  "  Echo  et  Narcisse,"  prepared  to 
leave  Paris,  his  royal  pupil  made  him  promise  to  return,  arid  con- 
ferred upon  him  as  a  parting  gift  the  title  of  music-master  to  the 
Children  of  France. 

But  the  queen  was  not  exclusive;  she  not  only  protected 
Gluck,  but  also  received  his  rival,  Piccini,  whom  she  even  par- 
doned for  having  received  for  a  moment  the  support  of  Madame 
du  Barry.  She  made  use  of  the  struggle  between  the  two  com- 
posers to  give  French  music  a  new  impetus;  while  preserving 
her  preferences,  she  distributed  her  favours  to  both  of  them. 
Piccini  had  scarcely  arrived  in  France  before  she  received  him ; 
she  took  singing  lessons  of  him  twice  a  week,  and  gave  him,  with 
the  title  of  composer  of  her  lyrical  spectacle,  a  salary  of  four 
thousand  livres,  which  he  was  still  drawing  at  the  beginning  of 
the  Revolution.  She  was  anxious  to  hear  the  first  two  acts  of 
"  Roland,"  which  she  had  him  rehearse  in  her  presence.  The  Prince 
de  Ligne  relates  that,  wishing  to  sing  before  her  Italian  master, 
whom  she  begged  to  accompany  her,  she  inadvertently  chose  a 
piece  from  Gluck's  "Alcestis."  But,  the  prince  added,  "the 
grace  with  which  she  repaired  these  mistakes,  which  she  often 
made,  and  a  sort  of  ingenuousness  which  became  her  well,  proved 
the  goodness  and  the  sensibility  of  a  beautiful  soul,  and  added  a 
charm  to  her  face,  whose  blushes  accompanied  her  pretty  regrets, 
excuses,  and  often  also  her  good  deeds." 

Besides  Gluck  and  Piccini,  there  was  Gretry,  whose  light  music 
pleased  her  infinitely.  She  consented  to  be  godmother  to  the 
composer's  daughter;  she  gave  her  her  name;  she  had  her  come 
every  month  to  Versailles,  where  she  overwhelmed  her  with  ca- 
resses and  presents ;  and  when  she  went  to  the  theatre,  after  the 
three  reverences  which  etiquette  required  her  to  make  to  the 
public,  her  eyes  sought  her  little  goddaughter,  and  she  threw  a 
kiss  to  her,  to  the  applause  of  the  spectators. 

And  later,  when  Gluck  had  definitely  deserted  Paris  for  Vienna, 
and  even  the  most  pressing  royal  appeals  could  not  recall  him, 
it  was  Sacchini  whom  the  queen  upheld  energetically  for  a  time 
against  the  secret  opposition  of  the  committee  of  the  opera  and 
the  malevolence  of  the  manager  of  the  Menus-Plaisirs,  Papilion 
de  la  Ferte, —  Sacchini,  whose  "  Dardanus  "  was  to  be  given  for  the 
first  time  on  the  stage  at  Trianon. 

There  was  also  Lemoyne,  whom  she  honoured  with  her  favour 


HER  TASTE  FOR  THE  STAGE.  189 

at  the  same  time  as  Sacchini ;  there  was  Salieri,  a  pupil  of  Gluck, 
whose  "  Danaides,"  attributed  to  the  collaboration  of  the  master, 
took  the  queen  to  the  opera,  eager  to  applaud  a  new  master-piece 
of  her  old  professor.  Madame  Campan  no  doubt  exaggerates 
when  she  attributes  to  Marie  Antoinette  the  degree  of  excellence 
to  which  French  music  then  attained.  But  it  is  certain  that  she 
contributed  much  by  her  patronage  to  lift  our  lyrical  stage  from 
its  old  routine,  and  to  infuse  new  spirit  into  it.  Her  taste  was  not 
always  as  infallibly  correct  as  her  friends  claimed,  but  it  is  none 
the  less  true  —  a  competent  critic  has  recognized  it  —  that 
among  the  works  which  she  honoured  with  her  protection,  she 
seldom  made  a  bad  choice  or  judged  incorrectly. 

After  the  composers  came  the  artists.  The  queen  showed 
great  kindness  to  Saint-Huberty,  who  deserved  it,  if  not  by  his 
character,  at  least  by  his  talent.  She  had  granted  to  Made- 
moiselle Trial  fifteen  hundred  livres  of  annual  pension.  When 
Garat  arrived  from  Bordeaux  at  the  age  of  sixteen,  and  created  a 
sensation  in  Paris,  she  wished  immediately  to  hear  him ;  she  sent 
for  him  in  a  carriage  with  six  horses;  she  obtained  for  him,  from 
the  king's  purse,  a  pension  of  six  thousand  livres  to  pay  his 
debts;  she  even  carried  her  condescension  so  far  —  she  repented 
of  it  later  —  as  to  sing  with  him.  She  also  received  Michu  from 
the  Comedie  Frangaise ;  she  admitted  him  to  her  intimacy,  and 
manifested  an  extreme  pleasure  in  listening  to  him ;  she  not  only 
listened  to  him,  but  took  lessons  from  him ;  and  it  was  owing  to 
these  lessons  that  she  passed  from  music  to  a  new  amusement, 
whither  we  must  follow  her,  and  which  leads  us  again  to  Trianon,  — 
the  stage. 

While  Marie  Antoinette  was  still  quite  young  she  had  shown  a 
lively  taste  for  the  stage.  While  she  was  still  only  dauphiness, 
she  had,  if  you  remember,  organized  with  her  brothers-in-law 
and  sisters-in-law  some  little  representations  in  her  private  apart- 
ment; and  only  the  fear  of  the  old  king  had  put  an  end  to  the 
amusement,  which  greatly  diverted  the  young  people.  After  she 
became  queen,  she  renounced  for  a  time  her  desire  to  appear 
upon  the  stage,  but  she  preserved  her  love  for  the  theatre.  At 
Marly,  a  stage  was  improvised  in  a  barn,  and  Montansier  went 
there  to  play.  At  Trianon,  after  the  theatre  had  been  built  in 
1778,  there  was  no  entertainment  without  a  play.  At  Choisy, 
during  their  little  visits,  there  was  a  play  almost  every  day  and 
sometimes  t\vice  a  day.  In  the  morning  opera,  and  French  or 


I90  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Italian  comedy  at  the  usual  hour;  in  the  evening,  at  eleven 
o'clock,  parodies  were  given,  where  the  chief  actors  of  the  opera 
appeared  in  the  most  bizarre  roles  and  costumes.  A  celebrated 
dancer,  named  Guimard,  took  the  principal  part.  Her  extreme 
thinness  and  little  cracked  voice  added  to  the  grotesqueness  of 
the  personages  whom  she  imitated.  But  the  queen  had  little  taste 
for  that  sort  of  diversion,  of  which,  on  the  other  hand,  Louis  XVI. 
was  very  fond.  Her  delicate  and  refined  nature  was  ill  in  accord 
with  those  parodies,  which  were  often  vulgar.  "  Is  that  all  ?  "  she 
asked,  yawning,  after  the  representation  on  the  stage  at  Versailles 
of  a  farce  entitled,  "  Les  Battus  paient  1'Amende,"  which  had  been 
a  great  success  at  Paris. 

Private  theatricals  were  then  more  the  fashion  than  ever.  At 
all  great  houses,  in  all  the  chateaux,  there  was  a  theatre  and  a 
company  of  amateurs  organized  like  any  real  company,  prac- 
tising like  them,  rehearsing  like  them,  and  taking  lessons  from 
actors  of  renown.  From  the  court  the  contagion  passed  to  the 
army,  and  an  ordinance  from  the  minister  of  war  was  necessary 
to  put  a  stop  to  an  amusement  to  which  the  officers  seemed  about 
to  sacrifice  their  profession. 

Certain  great  nobles  had,  besides  their  usual  residences,  a  little 
house  in  the  country,  situated  in  the  midst  of  gardens,  and 
especially  designed  for  dramatic  representations.  The  Due 
d'Orleans,  the  grandson  of  the  Regent,  had  a  theatre  of  this  sort 
at  Bagnolet  in  the  Faubourg  du  Roule ;  and  it  was  there  that  the 
greatest  number  of  the  comedies  of  Colle  were  given,  in  which 
the  pious  husband  of  Madame  de  Montesson  did  not  disdain  to 
accept  a  part.  The  Prince  de  Cond6  had  the  same  at  Chantilly, 
and  Madame  Elisabeth  herself  played  "  Nanine  "  with  her  friends. 

What  the  princes  of  the  blood  did,  and  what  the  great  king 
had  authorized  by  his  example,  Marie  Antoinette  wished  also  to 
do.  The  war  at  that  period  kept  all  the  officers  away  from  Ver- 
sailles ;  the  summer  had  sent  a  great  number  of  the  courtiers 
to  their  chateaux;  amusements  became  rare  at  court.  The 
queen  bethought  herself  of  this  new  means  to  break  the  mo- 
notony of  an  existence  which  dragged  painfully.  Like  the  Due 
d'Orleans,  she  resolved  to  have  and  had  her  company.  We  have 
described  the  theatre  above.  The  company  was  made  up  of  the 
intimates  of  the  Polignac  set:  first,  the  favourite;  her  daughter, 
the  Duchesse  de  Guiche ;  her  cousin,  Madame  de  Chalons ;  her 
sisters-in-law,  the  Comtesse  Diane  and  the  Comtesse  de  Polas- 


HER   THEATRE   AT   TRIANON. 


tron.  Madame  Campan  recounts  that  it  was  agreed  that,  with 
the  exception  of  the  Comte  d'Artois,  no  man  should  be  admitted 
to  the  company.  If  this  resolution  was  taken,  it  was  not  kept; 
for  from  the  first  we  find  among  the  actors  the  Comte  d'Adhe- 
mar,  the  Comte  Esterhazy,  and  Monsieur  de  Polignac,  who  were 
soon  joined  by  the  Comte  de  Vaudreuil,  the  Due  de  Guiche,  and 
the  Bailiff  of  Crussol.  The  organizer  of  all  the  details  was  the 
secretary  of  the  queen's  commands,  Monsieur  Campan,  to  the 
great  displeasure  of  the  Due  de  Fronsac,  who  saw  therein  an 
attack  on  his  prerogatives  as  first  gentleman  of  the  chamber; 
he  made  a  written  appeal  and  received  the  following  response  : 
"  You  cannot  be  first  gentleman  when  we  are  only  actors.  I  have 
told  you  my  wishes  with  regard  to  Trianon.  I  hold  no  court 
there  ;  I  live  there  as  a  private  person,  and  Monsieur  Campan 
will  always  be  charged  with  the  orders  relative  to  the  entertain- 
ments which  I  wish  to  give  there."  The  duke  would  not  ac- 
knowledge himself  beaten,  and  whenever  he  went  to  the  toilet 
of  the  queen,  did  not  fail  to  let  fall  some  remark  against  his 
"  colleague,"  Campan.  The  queen  shrugged  her  shoulders,  and 
when  he  was  gone,  said,  "  It  is  distressing  to  find  so  petty  a  man 
in  the  son  of  the  Marechal  de  Richelieu." 

The  professors  were  Dazincourt,  Caillot,  a  celebrated  actor 
who  had  long  since  retired  from  the  theatre,  and  Michu  from  the 
Comedie  Italienne,  —  the  first  for  comedy,  the  two  others  for 
comic  opera. 

When  the  august  company  thought  themselves  sufficiently  per- 
fect, they  made  their  debut  on  Aug.  I,  1780,  and  as  a  beginning 
attacked  two  of  the  pieces  best  known  at  that  epoch,  and  where- 
in consequently  comparison  was  the  more  dangerous  with  pro- 
fessional actors,  —  "  Le  Roi  et  le  Fermier,"  by  Sedaine  and  Mon- 
signy,  and  "  La  Gageure  Imprevue  "  by  Sedaine.  "  The  queen," 
Grimm  says  in  his  correspondence,  speaking  of  this  first  repre- 
sentation, —  "  the  queen,  to  whom  no  grace  is  foreign,  and  who 
knows  how  to  adopt  them  all  without  losing  her  own,  played  in 
the  first  piece  the  r61e  of  Jenny,  and  in  the  second  that  of  the  sou- 
brette."  There  were  no  spectators  besides  the  king  and  the  princes 
and  princesses  of  the  royal  family  without  any.  following;  in  the 
parterre,  the  subordinate  servants,  such  as  waiting-women,  foot- 
men, and  hussars,  \yho  found  themselves  at  Trianon  by  reason  of 
their  service,  —  in  all,  about  forty  people.  Through  the  praises, 
somewhat  emphatic,  of  Grimm,  and  despite  the  inexperience  of 


192  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  artists,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  the  success  of  the  first  entertain- 
ment was  satisfactory.  The  king  was  greatly  amused ;  the  actors 
were  enchanted.  Ten  days  later  they  began  again  with  a  comic 
opera  by  Sedaine  and  Monsigny,  "On  ne  s'avise  jamais  de  tout," 
and  the  comedy  by  Barthe,  "Les  Fausses  Infidelites,"  then  on  Sep- 
tember 6,  appeared  in  "  L' Anglais  a  Bordeaux  "  and  "  Le  Sorcier." 
This  time  the  queen  desired  to  have  her  sister-in-law,  Madame,  join 
the  company,  in  order  to  give  it  credit  in  the  eyes  of  the  public. 
Madame  asked  nothing  better,  more  perhaps  from  policy  than 
from  taste,  but  Monsieur  formally  forbade  it.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  king  did  not  disguise  the  pleasure  which  he  took  in  these 
diversions;  he  prolonged  his  evenings,  and  seemed  in  no  hurry 
to  retire  at  his  ordinary  hour,  even  assisting  at  the  rehearsals, 
and  when  the  queen  performed  her  part,  himself  gave  the  signal 
for  applause.  The  play  lasted  till  nine  o'clock,  and  was  followed 
by  a  supper  for  the  members  of  the  royal  family  and  the  actors 
and  actresses.  On  leaving  the  table,  the  court  separated,  and 
there  were  no  late  hours. 

Encouraged  by  this  approbation,  they  made  another  attempt 
on  September  19.  At  the  last  moment  the  queen  wished  to  put 
off  the  representation  because  of  her  daughter's  indisposition.  It 
was  the  king  who  declared  that  there  was  nothing  alarming  in 
the  condition  of  the  young  princess,  and  that  they  must  not 
change  the  amusement  of  the  day.  This  time  they  chose  two 
pieces  that  had  created  a  sensation  at  the  Come'die  Italienne  and 
at  the  opera:  "Rose  et  Colas"  by  Sedaine  and  Monsigny,  and 
the  "  Soothsayer  of  the  Village,"  by  Rousseau.  In  this  last 
piece  especially,  they  not  only  exposed  themselves  to  compari- 
son with  the  first  artists  of  the  opera,  but  evoked  the  dangerous 
memory  of  Madame  de  Pompadour's  excellent  company.  The 
comparison,  however,  does  not  seem  to  have  been  too  unfavour- 
able. The  Comte  d'Adh^mar  indeed  provoked  some  ironical 
smiles  by  his  tremulous  voice  and  white  hair,  somewhat  out  of 
place  in  the  r61e  of  the  shepherd  Colin ;  and  the  queen  had  the 
right  to  say  that  it  would  be  difficult  even  for  malice  to  find  any- 
thing to  arraign  in  her  choice  of  a  lover.  But  the  Comte  de 
Vaudreuil,  the  best  amateur  actor  of  Paris,  according  to  Grimm, 
played  the  part  of  the  soothsayer  very  well ;  and  Mercy,  who  was 
present  at  the  representation  in  a  grated  loge,  on  Marie  Antoi- 
nette's formal  request,  and  who  disapproved  in  his  heart  of  this 
species  of  amusement,  —  Mercy  wrote  to  Maria  Theresa,  who 
was  also  alarmed  at  this  new  amusement,  — 


HER  THEATRE    AT    TRIANON.  193 

"  The  queen  has  a  very  agreeable  and  correct  voice ;  her  manner  of 
playing  is  noble  and  full  of  grace.  On  the  whole,  the  play  was  as  well 
given  as  it  could  be  by  any  company  of  amateurs.  I  observed  that  the 
king  followed  it  with  an  attention  and  pleasure  that  was  manifest  in  his 
whole  mien ;  during  the  entr'actes,  he  ascended  the  stage  and  went  to  the 
dressing-room  of  the  queen." 

The  public  was  less  good-natured  than  the  king,  and  more 
exacting  than  Mercy.  Hurt  at  being  excluded  from  these  pri- 
vate representations,  they  criticised  them  with  bitterness ;  and 
the  journals,  always  ill-disposed,  fell  with  avidity  upon  the 
thousand  anecdotes  invented  by  the  malcontents.  It  was  related 
that  the  king,  who,  they  said,  was  only  present  from  amiability,  did 
not  hesitate  to  hiss  his  august  consort.  They  asserted  that  the 
queen,  annoyed  at  not  having  more  spectators,  had  the  body- 
guards enter ;  and  that  at  the  end  of  the  evening,  she  had  ad- 
vanced to  the  front  of  the  stage,  and  had  so  far  forgotten  her 
dignity  as  to  say,  "  Gentlemen,  I  have  done  what  I  could  to 
amuse  you ;  I  would  have  wished  to  act  better  in  order  to  give 
you  more  pleasure."  These  anecdotes  were  false;  the  docu- 
ments to-day  allow  us  to  affirm  it ;  none  the  less  they  circulated 
among  the  people,  and  were  the  more  acceptable  in  proportion 
as  they  were  malicious  and  hurtful  to  the  reputation  of  the 
queen. 

The  spectacle  at  Trianon  was  interrupted  in  1781,  owing  to  an 
indisposition  of  Marie  Antoinette,  or  perhaps  in  consequence  of 
Mercy's  observation,  but  were  begun  again  in  1782,  with  the  "  Sage 
etourdi  "  by  Boissy,  and  the  "  Veillee  villageoise,"  by  Piis  and 
Barre  ;  in  1783  with  the  "  Tonnelier "  of  Audinot,  and  the 
"  Sabots  "  of  Sedaine,  then  with  "  Isabelle  and  Gertrude "  by 
Favart,  and  the  "  Deux  Chasseurs  et  la  Laitiere  "  of  Anseaume 
and  Duni.  The  queen  concerned  herself  with  every  detail ;  she 
superintended  the  least  addition  and  had  the  scenes  which  seemed 
to  her  insufficient  or  worn  out  repainted.  She  was,  in  a  word, 
the  supreme  director  of  her  company,  and  showed  herself  jealous 
of  her  authority.  "  It  seems  to  me,"  she  wrote,  "  that  my  little 
company  at  Trianon  should  be  exempt  from  the  rules  of  ordinary 
service."  The  prudent  severity  with  regard  to  the  first  represen- 
tations became  relaxed.  The  audience,  which  had  at  first  been 
strictly  limited  to  the  royal  family,  and  in  the  parterre  to  some 
waiting-women,  was  enlarged  little  by  little.  The  door  which  in 
1 780  was  closed  even  to  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe  was  finally 
VOL.  i. — 13 


194  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

opened  to  some  ladies  of  the  court,  then  to  the  officers  of  the 
Life  Guards,  and  the  equerries  of  the  king,  and  to  his  brothers. 
They  had  begun  with  forty  spectators ;  they  ended  with  two 
hundred. 

What  was  in  reality  the  artistic  value  of  this  company  at 
Trianon?  In  the  midst  of  so  many  contradictory  opinions,  some 
of  them  severe  from  malice,  others  laudatory,  perhaps  from  flat- 
tery, it  is  difficult  to  form  a  judgment.  It  seems,  however,  that 
the  criticism  of  Mercy  was  the  most  impartial :  the  company  at 
Trianon  was  neither  better  nor  worse  than  ordinary  amateur 
companies.  The  Comte  d'Artois  displayed  agreeable  talent;  the 
Comte  de  Vaudreuil  proved  himself  a  good  actor.  As  for  the 
queen,  if  one  spectator,  according  to  the  testimony  of  Ba- 
chaumont,  —  but  the  anecdote  appears  untrustworthy,  —  said  that 
her  acting  was  royally  bad,  the  Chevalier  de  Lille,  a  connoisseur, 
who  saw  her  in  the  "  Veil  lee  villageoise,"  wrote  that  she  played 
her  part  of  Babet  delightfully.  It  seems  certain  at  all  times 
that  the  august  actors  were  more  successful  in  comedy  than  in 
comic  opera,  nor  had  they  any  illusions  on  the  subject  of  their 
lyrical  capacities. 

Was  it  their  confidence  in  their  talents  as  comedians  that  led 
them  to  attempt  in  1775  the  famous  comedy  of  Beaumarchais, 
"The  Barber  of  Seville"?  "The  Barber  of  Seville"  was  the  last 
effort  of  the  company ;  it  was  the  closing  of  the  theatre  at  Trianon, 
but  that  representation,  which  was  an  imprudence,  belongs  to 
darker  days,  and  we  are  still  in  the  period  of  happy  days. 
We  shall  speak  of  it  later,  and  for  the  present  content  ourselves 
with  listening  to  the  dull  grumblings  of  the  storm  gathering  in 
the  distance. 

Malice,  which  had  not  ceased  to  follow  Marie  Antoinette  from 
her  entrance  into  France,  and  pursue  every  act  and  word,  attacked 
Trianon  with  especial  bitterness,  because  more  than  anything  else 
Trianon  was  herself.  They  affected  to  see  in  the  embellishments 
which  the  queen  bestowed  upon  her  favourite  residence  one  of  the 
causes,  even  the  principal  cause,  of  the  deficit  in  the  treasury ;  and 
this  rumour,  started  at  Versailles  in  a  little  circle  of  malcontents, 
propagated  at  Paris  and  in  the  country,  repeated  its  echoes  in  the 
requisitions  of  Fouquier-Tinville,  even  in  the  questions  of  Dumas, 
who  at  the  Revolutionary  tribunal  catechised  the  queen  upon  "  the 
millions  sunk  at  Trianon."  These  millions  reduced  themselves 
to  one  and  a  half,  or  two  at  most,  spread  over  fifteen  years,  from 


THE    EXPENSES    OF   TRIANON.  195 

1776  to  1790.  It  has  been  proved  that  the  average  expense 
necessitated  by  the  creation  or  preservation  of  so  many  charming 
fancies  scarely  exceeded  one  hundred  or  one  hundred  and  thirty 
livres  a  year;  the  total  amount  for  the  buildings  did  not  reach 
more  than  five  hundred  thousand  livres;  the  decoration  has  been 
estimated  at  not  more  than  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  livres. 
The  account  of  the  sculptor,  Deschamps,  for  example,  who  cov- 
ered the  walls  and  pediments  of  those  enchanting  buildings 
with  his  arabesques,  only  amounted,  from  Oct.  6,  1777,  to  Sept. 
15,  1786,  to  one  hundred  and  thirteen  thousand  six  hundred 
and  sixty-five  livres,  and  was  not  settled  until  Aug.  31,  1791. 
Mercy  himself,  who  in  his  reports  to  Maria  Theresa  exhibited 
some  alarm  at  what  this  new  domain  might  cost  the  queen,  only 
estimates  the  expense  of  the  English  park  at  one  hundred  and 
fifty  thousand  livres.  A  memorandum  of  Monsieur  d'Angivil- 
Hers,  preserved  in  the  archives,  confirms  that  in  1777  the  total 
amount  for  making  the  garden  at  Trianon,  which  he  said  the 
queen  was  in  a  great  hurry  to  enjoy,  only  reached  three  hundred 
and  fifty-two  thousand  two  hundred  and  seventy-five  livres,  ten 
sous,  and  ten  deniers.  If  one  wishes  to  enter  into  details,  the  keep- 
ing up  of  the  gardens,  which  under  Louis  XV.  exceeded  thirty 
thousand  livres,  was  in  1775  but  twelve  thousand;  in  1777  but 
fifteen  thousand,  and  in  the  end  only  six  thousand  four  hundred 
and  seventy-six  thousand  livres,  and  twelve  sous ;  the  Chinese 
pavilion  and  roundabout  cost  forty-one  thousand  livres;  the 
rock  whence  sprang  the  river  nine  thousand;  the  Belvedere,  that 
exquisite  model,  about  sixty-five  thousand.  What  is  this  in 
comparison  with  the  expenditures  of  the  financiers  of  the  time, 
of  Boutin  at  Tivoli,  or  of  Laborde  at  Mereville?  Even  the 
theatre  of  the  queen,  which  excited  so  much  criticism,  and  with 
perhaps  some  justice,  —  that  theatre  with  its  small  company,  its 
limited  orchestra,  its  choruses,  its  infrequent  representations, — 
what  was  it  compared  to  that  of  the  Duchesse  du  Maine  at 
Sceaux,  and,  above  all,  to  that  of  the  Pctits  Cabinets  of  Madame 
de  Pompadour,  which  was  kept  up  at  the  greatest  expense,  and 
which  in  six  years  had  given  not  less  than  sixty  works,  many  of 
which  were  repeated  as  many  as  five  or  six  times? 

We  must  avow,  however,  that  if  malice  has  greatly  exaggerated 
the  so-called  prodigalities  of  the  queen  in  her  gracious  domain, 
Trianon  was  none  the  less  not  without  its  disadvantages.  Even  the 
most  devoted  friends  of  Marie  Antoinette  regretted,  and  she  her- 


196  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

self  regretted  later,  her  taste  for  the  theatre,  which  led  her  to  con- 
sort with  comedians,  to  receive  their  counsels,  to  play  their  parts. 
It  seemed  hardly  compatible  with  the  majesty  of  a  throne  that 
the  queen  should  travesty  herself  as  a  soubrette.  With  regard  to 
the  public  it  was  even  worse.  The  people  easily  pardon  expen- 
ditures, even  follies,  which  they  enjoy,  while  they  are  always  dis- 
posed to  exaggerate  those  in  which  they  have  no  share.  Excluded 
from  the  entertainments  at  Trianon,  they  regarded  them  as  ruin- 
ous prodigalities,  and  as  insults  to  their  misery.  Hence  arose 
those  malevolent  stories  which  incriminated  all  the  acts  of  Marie 
Antoinette,  her  walks,  her  words,  her  affections,  which  imputed 
to  her  a  levity  and  an  imaginary  insolence,  and  which  found  such 
easy  access  to  prejudiced  minds.  A  few  bundles  of  dry  branches 
were  burned  to  illuminate  the  park  for  the  visit  of  Joseph  II. ; 
public  opinion  was  immediately  aroused  against  this  unheard-of 
excess,  and  the  three  thousand  fagots  were  transformed  in  popular 
imagination  to  an  entire  forest. 

The  court  was  not  less  incensed.  Those  who  were  not  invited 
to  Trianon  were  jealous  of  those  who  were  admitted.  The  exclu- 
sive favour  shown  to  a  few  persons  hurt  those  who  did  not  partake 
of  it.  The  ladies  of  the  palace  whose  service  only  necessitated 
their  appearance  on  Sundays  and  state  days  at  the  toilet  of  the 
queen  and  at  the  services  of  the  church,  were  loud  in  their  com- 
plaints, not  only  against  those  who  had  entrance  to  Trianon,  but 
against  the  princess  who  bestowed  her  favours  so  unequally. 
Jealousy  turned  their  heads,  and  gave  birth  to  a  sort  of  "  aliena- 
tion," as  Mercy  said.  No  one  went  to  Trianon ;  but  neither  did 
they  go  to  Versailles. 

Court  was  hardly  held ;  the  palace  became  a  desert.  Versailles, 
the  theatre  of  the  magnificence  of  Louis  XIV.,  whither  persons 
had  eagerly  thronged  from  all  parts  of  Europe  to  take  lessons  in 
politeness  and  good  taste,  became,  a  contemporary  has  said, 
only  little  country  town,  whither  one  went  with  reluctance,  and 
whence  one  fled  as  quickly  as  possible.  Ambition  and  cupidity 
were  none  the  less  active,  but  one  sought  rather  to  gain  protectors 
among  the  personages  in  power,  and  favours  were  only  obtained 
second-hand.  Thus  authority  was  weakened  at  the  moment  that 
disaffection  began,  and  respect  was  lost.  When  the  king,  yielding 
to  his  love  of  simplicity  and  solitude,  countenanced  the  amuse- 
ments of  Trianon,  and  a  form  of  society  which  was  too  limited  for 
a  nation  as  lively,  eager,  and  fond  of  splendour  as  the  French,  he 


ENVY   OF   THE    COURTIERS.  197 

did  not  see  that  in  affecting  the  habits  and  existence  of  a  private 
man  he  said  to  his  people,  accustomed  to  pompous  etiquette,  and 
to  the  traditions  of  majesty,  not  only  of  Louis  XIV.,  but  even  of 
Louis  XV.,  that  their  successor  had  neither  the  tastes  nor  virtues 
of  a  monarch.  When  the  queen,  who  seemed  destined  by  nature 
to  occupy  the  first  throne  of  the  world,  escaped  from  her  duties  of 
receiving  to  open  her  heart  to  Madame  de  Polignac,  and  to  shut 
herself  up  with  her  at  Trianon,  the  courtiers,  envious  of  a  partiality 
which  seemed  to  them  exclusive,  spied  upon  the  least  grace  ac- 
corded to  the  favourite,  attributed  to  her  influence  the  actions  of 
the  queen,  and  to  the  queen's  influence  the  resolutions  of  govern- 
ment, and  held  Marie  Antoinette  responsible  for  the  elevation  of 
the  one  and  the  discomfiture  of  the  other,  for  the  deficit  in  the 
treasury,  for  the  increase  in  taxes,  and  heaped  upon  her  head  those 
tempests  of  unpopularity  and  those  storms  of  rage  whose  first 
flashes  disturbed  Mercy,  wrung  tears  from  Maria  Theresa  on  her 
death-bed,  and  brought  upon  the  young  and  imprudent  sovereign 
the  severe  and  sometimes  brutal  remonstrances  of  her  brother, 
Joseph  II. 


CHAPTER    XV. 

JOSEPH  II.'s  JOURNEY  TO  FRANCE.  —  CHARACTER  OF  THE  EMPEROR; 
HIS  PLAN  OF  THE  JOURNEY  FORMED,  ABANDONED,  TAKEN  UP  AGAIN. 
—  THE  QUEEN'S  JOY  ON  SEEING  HER  BROTHER.  —  FIRST  INTER- 
VIEWS. —  REPRIMANDS  OFTEN  MALADROIT.  —  THE  EMPEROR  AND 
THE  QUEEN  AT  THE  OPERA.  —  VISITS  TO  THE  MONUMENTS  AND 
PRINCIPAL  INSTITUTIONS  OF  THE  CITY  OF  PARIS.  —  AFFECTATION  OF 
SIMPLICITY. —  ENTHUSIASM  OF  THE  PUBLIC. —  DEPARTURE  OF  THE 
EMPEROR;  HIS  OPINION  OF  THE  QUEEN.  —  ADVICE  WHICH  HE  LEFT 
HER  IN  WRITING.  —  THE  QUEEN  CONFORMS  TO  IT  DURING  A  TIME, 
THEN  FALLS  AGAIN  INTO  DISSIPATION.  —  WHY  ? 

IT  had  been  a  long  time  since  Joseph  II.  had  formed  the  project 
of  going  to  France.     In  the  very  year  of  the  dauphiness's 
marriage,  he  had  informed  his  ambassador,  the  Comte  de  Mercy, 
of  his  intention. 

This  prince  possessed  an  inquiring  but  ill-balanced  mind,  was 
obstinate  rather  than  firm,  had  more  vivacity  than  good  sense, 
conceived  vast  plans,  but  did  not  mature  them,  had  a  passion  for 
little  things,  and  lost  himself  in  details,  —  "  governed  too  much,"  as 
the  Prince  de  Ligne  said,  "  but  did  not  reign  enough," —  used  the 
language  of  a  liberal  with  the  conduct  of  an  absolute  monarch, 
and  spoiled  really  good  qualities  by  his  unfortunate  defects. 
With  the  desire  to  learn,  he  had  not  the  patience  to  study. 
"  His  questions,"  Gleichen  said,  "  seemed  to  seek  counsel,  but 
usually  only  sought  to  find  advice  that  accorded  with  his  own 
views."  On  the  death  of  his  father  in  1765,  he  became  emperor, 
and  distressed  his  mother  by  his  restless  interference,  his  unquiet 
precipitation,  his  mania  for  change,  his  philosophical  Utopias,  his 
feverish  ambition,  which  neither  the  vigour  of  his  talents,  the 
clearness  of  his  views,  nor  his  force  of  character  warranted.  He 
sincerely  desired  the  happiness  of  his  people,  but  desired  it  as  a 
theorist  rather  than  as  a  practical  man,  and  only  succeeded  in 
elevating  them  by  vexatious  reforms,  which  were  repugnant  to 
their  traditions,  to  their  customs,  and  to  their  beliefs.  Fourteen 


JOSEPH    II.'S   JOURNEY   TO   FRANCE.  199 

years  older  than  Marie  Antoinette,  he  assumed  toward  her  the 
attitude  of  a  father,  spoke  to  her  with  the  authority  of  experience, 
but  he  too  often  counteracted  the  wisdom  of  his  advice  by  his 
dryness  of  tone  and  brusqueness  of  manner.  He  forgot  too 
readily  that  the  child  he  had  lectured  at  Vienna  was  grown  up, 
that  the  dauphiness  was  become  queen.  The  young  princess, 
though  usually  docile  and  deferential  toward  the  brother  whom 
she  loved  dearly,  sometimes  rebelled  against  his  dominating  airs, 
and  the  sarcastic  lessons  of  a  mentor  who  insisted  upon  writing  to 
her  in  German  and  treating  her  as  a  little  girl.  These  were,  how- 
ever, only  passing  clouds.  Their  correspondence  soon  resumed 
its  affectionate  tone ;  and  it  was  in  great  part  the  desire  to  see 
Marie  Antoinette  that  determined  the  emperor  to  visit  France, — 
a  country  which  he  did  not  love,  and  against  which  he,  together 
with  all  the  principal  nobles  of  his  court,  nourished  invincible 
prejudices.  To  see  the  queen,  to  study  her  character  and  conduct, 
to  make  the  personal  acquaintance  of  the  king,  to  judge  of  the 
situation  of  the  court  for  the  present  and  the  future,  to  observe 
all  that  a  great  monarchy  can  offer  of  interest  in  matters  of  re- 
source, administration,  agriculture,  finance,  commerce,  marine,  and 
military,  —  such  were  the  principal  objects,  according  to  his  own 
avowal,  which  the  emperor  proposed  to  himself;  such  were  the 
fruits  which  he  counted  on  gathering  from  his  voyage. 

Marie  Antoinette  was  exceedingly  happy  at  the  thought  of 
seeing  her  brother;  he  was  for  her  an  image  of  her  country,  a 
living  portrait  of  her  mother.  But  this  joy,  it  must  be  said,  was 
not  unalloyed  with  some  disquietude.  What  would  Joseph  II. 
think  of  the  court  of  France?  What  would  he  think  of  the  king? 
Above  all,  what  would  he  think  of  the  society  of  the  queen,  and 
of  the  manner  of  life  which  she  had  adopted?  What  would  be  his 
sentence?  What  might  he  not  perhaps  reprove,  —  he  who  had 
one  day  written  so  severe  a  letter  to  his  sister  that  Maria  Theresa 
was  obliged  to  prevent  him  from  sending  it?  Might  there  not 
result  bitternesses,  coldnesses,  perhaps  even  an  open  rupture? 
Such  were  Marie  Antoinette's  apprehensions  and  Mercy's  fears. 

This  journey  of  Joseph  II. —  which  was  several  times  aban- 
doned and  taken  up  again,  then  put  off  at  the  last  moment  be- 
cause of  the  rigour  of  the  winter  and  the  political  occurrences 
in  Bohemia  and  Germany;  which  was  disapproved  of  by  Maria 
Theresa,  who  was  not  informed  of  it  until  after  every  one  else  — 
did  not  finally  take  place  until  the  spring  of  1777.  The  emperor 


200  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

had  resolved  upon  maintaining  the  most  strict  incognito  in  France, 
to  the  great  grief  of  the  queen,  who  would  have  wished  to  have 
her  brother  received  according  to  his  rank,  as  a  great  and  powerful 
monarch,  and  to  the  great  annoyance  of  the  empress,  who  loved  not 
his  affectation  of  simplicity,  which  was  more  apparent  than  real. 
His  decision  in  this  respect  had  been  official.  No  lodging  in  the 
palace  at  Versailles  nor  at  Trianon ;  at  Paris  an  apartment  with 
the  ambassador,  at  the  Petit  Luxembourg,  but  all  appearance  of 
official  reception  was  to  be  avoided ;  at  Versailles,  two  rooms  in 
an  hotel  garni,  the  Hotel  du  Juste,  which  was  decently  furnished 
but  without  elegance;  at  the  chateau  a  small  chamber  in  the 
queen's  entresol,  where  he  could  take  a  few  moments'  rest  during 
the  day.  No  state  coach,  only  a  simple  hired  carriage. 

On  Wednesday,  April  18,  at  half-past  seven  in  the  evening, 
Joseph  II.  arrived  at  Paris,  under  the  name  of  the  Count  von  Falk- 
enstein.  On  the  following  morning  at  eight  o'clock  he  set  out  for 
Versailles.  ,  In  default  of  Mercy,  who  was  kept  in  bed  by  an  indis- 
position, the  Abbe  de  Verrnond  received  the  emperor  on  his  de- 
scent from  the  carriage,  and  conducted  him  alone  by  a  secret 
staircase  to  the  room  where  the  queen  awaited  him.  "  I  desire," 
Joseph  II.  had  written,  "  that  she  should  await  me  in  her  boudoir 
without  coming  to  meet  me,  and  that  there,  in  order  to  avoid  a 
scene  before  others,  we  should  be  alone,  to  manifest  to  each 
other  the  pleasure  which  we  have  in  seeing  each  other  again." 
This  pleasure  was  great;  the  meeting  was  touching.  The  brother 
and  sister  embraced  each  other  tenderly,  and  remained  for  a 
moment  without  speaking.  Then  their  hearts  opened,  and  the 
interview  became  lively  and  confidential.  The  emperor,  con- 
trary to  all  expectation,  was  tender  and  almost  flattering.  He 
said  to  the  queen  that  if  she  were  not  his  sister,  and  he  could  be 
united  to  her,  he  \vould  not  hesitate  to  marry  again  in  order  to 
gain  so  charming  a  companion.  The  young  woman,  the  more 
touched  by  the  compliment  as  she  had  not  expected  it,  opened 
her  heart  and  with  unlooked-for  abandon  talked  frankly  of  her 
situation,  of  her  tastes,  of  her  companions,  only  preserving  a  cer- 
tain reticence  on  the  subject  of  her  favourites.  The  ice  was 
broken;  all  embarrassment  disappeared;  the  conversation,  which 
was  intimate  and  confidential  on  the  part  of  Marie  Antoinette, 
affectionate  and  discreet  on  the  part  of  Joseph  II.,  was  prolonged. 
The  queen  afterward  led  her  brother  to  the  king ;  the  two  mon- 
archs  embraced ;  the  king  made  a  few  remarks,  which  showed 


CRITICISED   BY  JOSEPH   II.  2OI 

his  desire  to  appear  cordial  and  sincere ;  the  emperor  was  sat- 
isfied, and  from  the  first  moment  succeeded  in  putting  the  king 
at  his  ease.  Then  after  visits  to  the  princes  and  princesses  of  the 
royal  family,  and  to  the  ministers,  after  a  supper  in  the  queen's 
apartments,  the  Count  von  Falkenstein  returned  to  sleep  at  Paris. 
Thus  passed  the  first  day. 

During  the  following  days  the  conversations  between  the  em- 
peror and  the  queen  were  renewed ;  sometimes  at  Trianon,  in  the 
intimacy  of  a  solitary  walk,  sometimes  at  Versailles,  Joseph  II. 
took  up  in  detail  the  subjects  which  he  had  already  broached  with 
his  sister.  He  pointed  out  to  her  the  dangers  of  her  situation, 
drew  a  striking  picture  of  the  ease  with  which  she  allowed  herself 
to  be  led  on  by  her  love  of  pleasure,  and  the  deplorable  conse- 
quences which  her  weakness  would  infallibly  entail  in  the  future, 
insisted  upon  the  necessity  of  arresting  herself  on  that  declivity, 
of  showing  more  deference  toward  the  king,  of  giving  up  gaming, 
of  applying  herself  to  serious  occupations,  and,  above  all,  shed  a 
clear  light  upon  the  drawbacks  of  the  queen's  society.  Of  her  set, 
the  Due  de  Coigny  alone  found  grace  before  the  emperor;  while 
the  prince  judged  harshly,  even  too  harshly,  of  Madame  de  Lam- 
balle,  Madame  de  Polignac,  and  the  Princesse  de  Guemenee,  whose 
gambling-house  he  arraigned  severely.  The  queen  did  not  de- 
fend Madame  de  Lamballe,  with  whom  she  was  then  disenchanted, 
but  she  sought  to  pacify  her  brother  on  the  score  of  Madame  de 
Guemenee  and  Madame  de  Polignac.  She  acknowledged,  more- 
over, without  difficulty  the  justice  of  the  emperor's  reasons,  for 
his  discourse  had  really  touched  her  and  disposed  her  to  serious 
reflections,  and  added  that  a  day  would  come  when  she  would 
follow  such  good  advice.  But  owing  to  a  feeling  of  pride  she 
was  reluctant  to  modify  all  at  once  her  manner  of  life :  she  was 
afraid  of  seeming  to  yield  to  pressure.  The  public  must  not  be 
able  to  say  that  the  emperor  had  come  from  Austria  to  discipline 
and  correct  his  little  sister. 

The  manner  of  Joseph  II.  warranted  but  too  well  such  fears  on 
the  part  of  the  queen.  Of  an  absolute  and  dominating  character, 
and  more  disposed  to  criticism  than  leniency,  the  august  dictator 
was  not  always  able  to  retain  the  cordial  and  affectionate  tone 
which  Mercy  had  recommended  to  him,  and  to  which  he  had  at 
first  adhered.  He  forgot  too  readily  that  he  had  to  do  with  an 
ardent  and  proud  queen,  to  whom  it  was  necessary  to  use  the 
language  of  reason  and  kindness,  instead  of  the  severity  and 


202  LIFE  OF   MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

rudeness  which  were  natural  to  him ;  and  the  queen,  while  recog- 
nizing the  truth  of  her  brother's  observations,  was  often  justly 
hurt  by  his  manner  of  expressing  them.  It  even  happened  to 
the  emperor  to  give  his  sister  a  public  lesson  before  several  court- 
iers,  and  to  say  that  if  the  king  decided  on  visiting  his  kingdom, 
he  need  not  bring  his  wife  with  him,  "  who  was  of  no  use  to  him." 
At  another  time  he  declared  before  Mercy,  in  a  tone  singularly 
hard,  that  if  he  were  the  husband  of  the  queen,  he  should  know 
how  to  direct  her  wishes,  and  to  give  them  the  form  which  he 
desired.  Such  remarks  were  not  of  a  kind  to  please  the  princess. 
Her  legitimate  susceptibility  rebelled  against  his  pedantic  tone 
and  his  maladroit  authority.  "  I  should  take  everything  respect- 
fully from  my  mother,"  she  said ;  "  but  as  for  my  brother,  I  shall 
know  how  to  answer  him."  Hence  coldnesses,  bitternesses,  and 
momentary  ruptures,  and  that  declaration  which  the  queen  made 
to  the  emperor,  half  laughingly,  half  angrily,  that  if  he  prolonged 
his  sojourn  in  France  they  should  have  many  hot  disputes. 

At  bottom,  however,  she  wished  him  to  remain;  for  she  loved 
him  despite  his  brusqueness,  and  did  not  deny  that  his  counsels 
had  been  of  use  to  her.  She  did  all  she  could  to  retain  him. 
She  gave  him  a  watch  ornamented  with  her  portrait;  she  offered 
him  an  entertainment  at  Trianon, — "  an  entertainment  which  was 
very  well  arranged,"  Mercy  writes,  "  and  which  was  charming 
from  the  graciousness  which  the  queen  displayed  toward  every 
one."  The  king  tried  to  be  gay,  and  was  as  attentive  to  the  em- 
peror as  his  disposition  allowed.  The  English  park  was  lighted 
by  pans  of  fire  hidden  among  the  flowers ;  and  fagots  burning 
behind  the  Temple  of  Love  transformed  it  into  a  luminous  drawing- 
room,  whose  brilliancy  was  reflected  over  the  whole  garden. 

Marie  Antoinette  took  her  brother  to  the  Comedie  Fran£aise, 
and  to  the  opera.  At  the  latter,  —  it  was  on  April  25,  —  Gluck's 
"  Iphigenia  in  Aulis  "  was  given.  The  emperor  wished  tc  remain 
hidden  at  the  back  of  the  box ;  but  the  queen  seized  him  by 
the  hand  and  dragged  him  toward  the  front,  and  the  parterre 
burst  into  such  acclamations  that  the  opera  was  interrupted 
during  some  moments.  When  it  was  resumed,  they  sang  the 
chorus,  "  Sing,  let  us  celebrate  our  queen."  It  was  Joseph  II. 's 
turn  to  join  the  applause  which  greeted  his  sister,  and  the  public's 
to  say  that  if  the  archduke  had  somewhat  alienated  French 
hearts  from  their  sovereign,  the  emperor  had  given  them  back 
to  her. 


THE   EMPEROR   IN    PARIS.  203 

The  queen  enjoyed  this  triumph  and  the  growing  popularity 
of  her  brother.  Despite  the  care  which  the  august  traveller  took 
to  preserve  his  incognito,  there  were  noisy  demonstrations  every- 
where along  his  route.  His  hotel  was  surrounded  by  a  numerous 
crowd ;  and  wherever  he  went,  a  crowd  followed  him  and  impor- 
tuned him.  The  people  were  charmed  with  the  simplicity  of  a 
prince  who  walked  on  foot  through  the  streets,  without  appan- 
age or  suite,  dressed  in  a  modest  habit  of  green  or  plain  brown 
cloth ;  they  were  grateful  to  him,  they  said,  for  setting  so  good 
an  example  to  the  court  of  France.  By  one  of  those  inconsis- 
tencies of  the  French  character,  they  admired  in  the  brother  what 
they  thought  a  crime  in  the  sister.  The  economists  and  the 
philosophers  were  inexhaustible  in  their  praises  of  that  emperor 
who  shared  their  views  and  treated  them  as  equals,  —  of  that  sov- 
ereign of  a  vast  empire,  who  travelled  as  a  philosopher  and 
sought  instruction  rather  than  pleasure  from  his  journey.  Joseph 
II.  cultivated  these  dispositions  with  care ;  and  if  his  sarcastic  rail- 
lery against  the  fashions  displeased  certain  ladies  of  the  palace, 
it  his  sharp  and  public  criticisms  of  the  institutions  and  govern- 
ment seemed  in  bad  taste  to  certain  minds,  if  his  sarcasms  on  the 
etiquette  and  customs  of  the  court  could  only  encourage  his  sister 
in  a  path  which  she  was  but  too  disposed  to  follow, —  railleries  and 
criticisms  flattered  the  naturally  fault-finding  temper  of  the  pub- 
lic, while  his  visits  to  the  monuments,  and  his  study  of  the  work- 
ings of  the  administration  and  government,  pleased  those  culti- 
vated spirits  who  dictated  public  opinion. 

The  evenings  of  the  emperor  were  devoted  to  the  royal  family; 
his  days  were  reserved  for  himself  and  his  instruction.  Illustrious 
personages,  celebrated  places,  public  establishments,  —  he  forgot 
nothing,  visiting  Necker  and  Madame  Geoffrin,  the  Comtesse  de 
Brionne  and  Madame  du  Barry,  going  to  the  Imprimerie  Royale 
and  to  the  Gobelins,  to  Sevres,  to  Ermenonville,  to  the  school  at 
Alfort,  to  the  physical  laboratories  at  Passy,  to  the  garden  of 
Marechal  de  Biron,  and  to  Guimard's  house.  To  Buffon,  who 
was  ill,  he  graciously  said  that  he  had  come  in  search  of  that 
copy  of  his  works  which  his  brother  Maximilian  had  forgotten. 
At  the  institution  for  deaf  mutes  he  expressed  his  astonishment 
that  the  government  had  done  nothing  for  so  great  a  benefactor  of 
mankind  as  the  Abbe  de  1'fipee.  Sometimes  he  betook  himself 
to  the  Academic  Franchise,  where  D'Alembert,  under  cover  of  a 
lecture  on  synonymy,  addressed  ingenious  flatteries  to  him  ;  some- 


204  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

times  he  was  present  as  a  spectator  at  the  sittings  of  the  Academic 
des  Inscriptions  et  Belles-Lettres,  or  at  one  at  the  Academic  des 
Sciences.  Commerce,  industry,  government,  finance,  —  he  over- 
looked nothing  in  his  investigations.  Bertier  de  Sauvigny  ex- 
plained to  him  in  detail  the  organization  of  the  administration ; 
Laborde,  that  of  the  royal  treasury ;  Trudaine,  the  bridges  and 
roads;  Vergennes,  foreign  affairs;  Sartines,  the  navy.  The  prince 
criticised  several  points,  reproached  the  ministers  for  being  too 
much  master,  each  in  his  own  department,  so  that  when  the  king 
changed  ministers,  he  only  exchanged  his  bondage,  and  asserted 
that  they  sacrificed  reality  to  appearance,  utility  to  luxury,  in  their 
buildings  ;  but  on  the  whole  he  discarded  many  prejudices.  Paris 
charmed  him ;  the  nation  did  not  displease  him,  notwithstanding 
its  levity;  and  if  he  had  a  poor  opinion  of  those  who  governed, 
he  conceived  a  high  idea  of  the  resources  and  means  of  the 
monarchy,  were  those  resources  and  means  only  placed  in  com- 
petent hands. 

Unfortunately  he  did  not  perceive  the  competent  hands.  The 
ministers  in  power,  despite  the  civil  things  he  said  to  them,  did 
not  inspire  him  with  confidence,  and  he  dreaded  the  reinstate- 
ment of  Choiseul.  "  If  the  Due  de  Choiseul  had  been  in  office,  — 
to  the  satisfaction  of  the  king  and  the  lively  displeasure  of  the 
queen,  —  his  uneasy  and  turbulent  head  would  have  thrown  the 
kingdom  into  great  embarrassment."  The  archbishop  of  Tou- 
louse, Lomenie  de  Brienne,  alone  inspired  him  with  a  high  idea 
of  his  capacity,  which  fact  does  little  honour  to  his  imperial 
sagacity.  As  for  the  royal  family,  the  caustic  traveller  judged 
them  with  excessive  severity:  the  Comte  de  Provence  seemed 
to  him  an  "  unaccountable  creature ;  "  the  Comte  d'Artois,  a 
"  dandy  ; "  Mesdames,  "  good  creatures,  but  nonentities."  The 
king  pleased  him  more;  he  had  long  conversations  with  him 
wherein  the  young  monarch,  after  his  first  embarrassment,  had 
talked  to  him  in  all  confidence,  even  on  the  most  delicate  sub- 
jects, and  had  given  proof  of  solid  understanding.  Nevertheless, 
in  his  private  letters,  he  expressed  himself  in  extremely  harsh 
terms  in  speaking  of  his  brother-in-law.  "  This  man,"  he  wrote 
to  Leopold,  "is  somewhat  weak,  but  by  no  means  imbecile;  he 
has  ideas,  he  has  judgment;  but  there  is  a  physical  as  well  as 
mental  apathy.  He  talks  rationally  enough,  but  has  no  desire  to 
inform  himself,  no  curiosity;  in  fact,  the  fiat  lux  has  not  yet  gone 
forth  over  that  matter  without  form."  This  judgment  was  more 


PUBLIC   ENTHUSIASM    FOR  JOSEPH    II.  205 

than  harsh  ;  it  was  unjust.  If  the  qualities  of  the  king  were  para- 
lyzed by  his  timidity,  they  were  none  the  less  genuine;  and  if  his 
accomplishments  were  not  so  brilliant  as  those  of  Joseph  II.,  they 
were  as  extensive  and  probably  more  solid. 

The  emperor  had  not  pleased  all  the  members  of  the  royal 
family  equally.  While  Madame  Adelaide  had  dragged  him  into 
a  closet  on  pretext  of  looking  at  some  pictures,  and  then  kissed 
him,  telling  him  that  such  a  mark  of  friendship  might  well  be 
permitted  to  an  old  aunt,  the  Comte  de  Provence  was  but  little 
attracted  toward  the  queen's  brother. 

"  The  emperor,"  he  wrote  to  Gustavus  III.  "  is  mightily  cajoling,  a  great 
maker  of  protestations  and  vows  of  friendship  ;  but  on  closer  examination 
his  protestations  and  his  frank  air  hide  the  desire  to  pump  one,  as  we  say, 
and  to  dissemble  his  own  sentiments,  .  .  .  but  maladroitly,  for  with  a  little 
incense,  of  which  he  is  very  greedy,  far  from  his  finding  you  out,  you 
easily  find  him  out.  His  accomplishments  are  very  superficial." 

In  reality  it  was  perhaps  Monsieur  who  best  judged  him;  he 
had  divined  the  man  beneath  the  mask.  Joseph  II.  himself,  in  a 
private  letter  wherein  he  spoke  unreservedly,  naively  disclosed 

his  methods :  — 

"  You  are  better  than  I,"  he  wrote  to  his  brother  Leopold ;  "  but  I  am 
more  of  an  impostor,  and  in  this  country  one  must  be.  As  for  me,  I  dis- 
semble from  judgment  and  from  modesty ;  I  even  exaggerate  to  excess 
my  role  of  appearing  simple,  natural,  thoughtful.  But  that  is  what  has 
excited  an  enthusiasm  which  is  truly  embarrassing." 

It  would  be  difficult  to  avow  more  frankly  that  one  had  made 
sport  of  the  public  ;  but  the  public,  which  judges  only  by  appear- 
ances, was  caught  by  these  subterfuges.  It  manifested  not  only 
sympathy,  but,  as  Joseph  II.  said,  enthusiasm  for  him.  Save 
among  the  friends  of  Choiseul,  who  could  not  pardon  the  trav- 
eller for  having  addressed  only  an  insignificant  remark  to  the 
former  minister  when  he  passed  in  the  procession  of  the  cheva- 
liers of  the  St.  Esprit,  and  for  having  passed  through  Touraine 
without  stopping  at  Chanteloup,  while  he  had  gone  to  see  the 
Du  Barry  at  Lucienne,  the  impression  was  everywhere  the  same. 
Every  one  ran  after  the  emperor;  all  his  actions  were  indications 
of  wisdom ;  all  his  words  were  indications  of  genius.  "  One 
repeated  the  commonplaces  he  uttered  with  an  emphasis  to 
make  one  die  with  laughing,"  a  contemporary  wrote;  "  all  heads 
at  Paris  were  turned."  From  Paris  the  infatuation  spread  to 


205  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

the  whole  of  France,  and  cast  the  Comte  de  Provence  and  the 
Comte  d'Artois,  who  at  that  time  were  travelling  through  the 
middle  and  eastern  part  of  the  kingdom,  into  the  shade.  They 
literally  went  mad  about  the  heir  of  the  Hapsburgs.  Who  then 
thought  of  reproaching  Marie  Antoinette  for  being  an  Austrian? 

It  was  necessary,  however,  to  depart ;  the  emperor  was  begin- 
ning to  have  enough  of  his  r61e ;  and  although  Paris  pleased  him 
greatly,  and  he  was  proud  of  his  success,  he  ended  by  growing 
tired  of  the  perpetual  ovations.  Only  one  thing  held  him,  the 
thing  of  which  he  had  perhaps  thought  least  on  coming  to  France, 
—  the  charm  he  found  in  the  companionship  of  the  queen. 
That  humbug,  who  affected  simplicity  and  such  fine  indifference, 
had  been  caught  by  the  charm  of  intercourse  with  Marie  Antoi- 
nette. That  inflexible  censor  had  been  disarmed  by  the  bewitch- 
ing grace  of  that  young  sister  whom  he  chid  so  harshly  and  railed 
at  so  piteously,  but  of  whom  his  opinion  became  modified  each 
day;  with  the  tenderness  of  heart  which  he  knew  she  possessed, 
he  discovered  in  her  more  wisdom  and  intelligence  than  he  had 
expected.  At  the  last  moment  he  hesitated  to  go ;  and  in  pro- 
portion as  the  hour  of  departure  approached,  his  repugnance 
increased. 

The  queen  on  her  side  could  not  contemplate  without  regret 
the  departure  of  that  brother  whom  she  loved  despite  his  scold- 
ings, and  whose  counsels  she  appreciated  despite  their  gruffness ; 
it  seemed  to  her  like  a  final  rupture  of  family  ties.  It  was  on 
May  31,  in  the  evening,  after  a  long  day  passed  together  in 
serious  conversation,  that  they  said  farewell.  Joseph  II.  was 
moved ;  Marie  Antoinette  made  a  violent  effort  to  hide  her  grief, 
but  she  was  choking.  On  embracing  the  king,  the  emperor  said 
to  him  in  a  broken  voice  that  he  urgently  commended  to  him  a 
sister  whom  he  loved  tenderly ;  that  he  would  never  be  tranquil 
unless  he  knew  that  she  was  happy.  At  midnight  he  left  the 
chateau  to  return  to  his  h6tel.  On  the  following  morning,  at  six 
o'clock,  he  set  out  from  Versailles  for  St.-Germain-en-Laye,  where 
he  rejoined  his  suite.  The  queen  was  prostrated.  She  had  wished 
to  control  herself  before  her  brother;  but  when  he  was  gone,  she 
could  no  longer  control  herself,  and  had  a  violent  attack  of  hys- 
terics. On  the  following  day,  she  went  to  hide  her  grief  at 
Trianon  with  her  two  friends,  Madame  de  Polignac  and  Madame 
de  Lamballe.  On  her  return,  she  was  present  at  the  benediction, 
and  walked  alone  with  the  Comtesse  Jules  as  far  as  Rocquencourt ; 


JOSEPH    II.    LEAVES    HER  WRITTEN   ADVICE.  2O/ 

she  had  need  of  regaining  possession  of  herself  and  of  distracting 
her  thoughts. 

In  the  mean  while  Joseph  II.  continued  his  way  across  the 
provinces,  which  he  visited  in  their  turn,  but  he  was  not  less 
touched  than  Marie  Antoinette  ;  and  he  wrote  to  his  mother  with 
an  effusiveness  which  revealed  his  state  of  mind :  — 

"  I  quitted  Versailles  with  grief,  having  become  veritably  attached  to 
my  sister  ;  I  found  there  a  certain  sweetness  of  life  which  I  had  renounced, 
but  for  which  I  see  I  have  not  lost  the  taste.  She  is  amiable  and  charm- 
ing ;  I  passed  hours  and  hours  with  her,  without  perceiving  how  they 
flew.  Her  emotion  on  my  departure  was  great,  her  self-control  admi- 
rable j  it  required  all  my  force  to  find  legs  wherewith  to  go  away." 

Maria  Theresa  had  indeed  foreseen  it ;  the  emperor  had  fallen 
under  the  queen's  charm.  With  the  wish  on  parting  to  prolong 
in  some  way  the  serious  intercourse  which  they  had  had  together 
during  the  six  weeks  of  his  sojourn,  and  their  unreserved  inti- 
macy, he  had  made  out,  on  the  request  of  his  sister,  and  despite 
the  observations  of  Mercy,  who  would  have  preferred  a  more 
simple  form,  some  advice,  or  rather  a  long  instruction,  which  he 
left  to  her  in  writing,  under  the  title,  "  Reflections  given  to  the 
Queen  of  France." 

This  instruction,  a  veritable  catechism  of  her  conscience,  pre- 
sented to  the  young  princess  her  duties  under  two  heads,  — first, 
as  wife,  second,  as  queen.  The  emperor  avoided  with  care  all 
direct  reproach  ;  he  laid  down  principles  and  asked  questions. 
It  was  for  his  sister  to  reply  to  them  and  to  see  whether  she  ful- 
filled as  was  fitting  the  duties  of  her  station.  .  But  under  this 
indirect  form,  it  is  easy  to  perceive  the  personalities.  It  was  not 
a  catechism  for  the  use  of  all  women,  nor  even  for  all  queens;  it 
was  for  the  exclusive  use  of  Marie  Antoinette,  and  Joseph  II. 
showed  himself  therein,  beyond  doubt,  a  clear-sighted  judge,  but 
severe  to  excess,  not  to  say  unjust.  A  few  quotations  from  some 
of  the  most  important  passages  will  suffice  to  give  an  idea  of  it. 

"  What  hold  have  you,"  the  emperor  asked,  "  over  the  heart  of  the 
king,  and,  above  all,  over  his  esteem?  Examine  yourself:  Do  you  use 
every  effort  to  please  him  ?  Do  you  study  his  desires,  his  character,  in 
order  to  conform  thereto  ?  Do  you  seek  to  make  him  enjoy  your  com- 
pany and  the  pleasures  which  you  procure  for  him,  and  which  without  you 
he  would  find  void,  in  preference  to  everything  and  all  other  kinds  of 
amusement  ?  Does  he  see  your  affection  occupied  solely  with  him,  with 


208  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

making  him  shine  without  the  least  thought  of  yourself?  Do  you  curb 
your  desire  to  shine  at  his  expense,  to  be  affable  when  he  is  not  ? 

"  Are  you  clinging,  tender,  when  you  are  with  him  ?  Do  you  seek 
occasions,  do  you  respond  to  the  sentiments  which  he  allows  you  to  per- 
ceive ?  Do  you  make  him  your  confidant  ?  Do  you  never  abuse  or  repel 
the  confidences  which  he  makes  to  you  ?  Do  you  act  in  a  similar  manner 
and  tell  him  everything,  or  at  least  enough  for  him  to  hear  of  what  con- 
cerns you  and  interests  him,  first  from  you  rather  than  from  another  per- 
son? Do  you  give  up  things  when  you  see  that  he  desires  it?  Do  you 
ever  misuse  your  power  ?  ...  All  your  power  should  be  hidden ;  one 
should  suspect  it,  acting  and  influencing  everything,  but  one  should  see 
it  in  nothing.  The  king  alone,  your  husband,  should  by  his  position  act, 
and  you  should  never  appear  in  anything. 

"  Do  you  sufficiently  study  his  character  ?  Do  you  try  to  know  what 
he  does  when  he  is  alone  ?  Do  you  know  the  people  and  things  he  pre- 
fers ?  Do  you  try  not  to  bother  him,  and,  above  all,  never  to  allow  your 
presence  to  inconvenience  him  ?  Try  to  procure  for  the  king  those  com- 
panions who  please  him  ;  they  should  be  yours ;  and  if  he  has  any  preju- 
dice against  any  one,  even  of  your  friends,  you  should  sacrifice  them. 
Finally,  your  only  object  .  .  .  should  be  the  friendship,  the  confidence, 
of  the  king. 

"  As  queen  you  have  a  glorious  occupation  ;  you  should  fulfil  the  duties 
of  your  station.  Decency,  the  formation  of  the  court,  and,  above  all, 
appearances,  should  receive  great  consideration.  The  respect  which 
your  private  life  and  decorum  may  command  is  important ;  they  form  the 
two  grounds  for  the  public  judgment.  .  .  .  Have  not  your  manners  been 
somewhat  too  light?  Have  you  not  adopted  at  the  court  some  of  the 
fashions  that  were  in  vogue  when  you  came  here,  or  those  of  several 
ladies,  who,  although  amiable  and  respectable,  should  not  serve  as  models 
for  you,  for  you  cannot  find  a  model  outside  of  your  station  ?  The  more 
serious  the  king  is,  the  more  should  the  court  seem  to  model  itself  upon 
him.  Have  you  weighed  the  consequences  of  your  visits  to  the  salons  of 
those  ladies  where  promiscuous  company  is  assembled,  and  whose  charac- 
ter is  not  respected  ?  Have  you  thought  of  the  effect  which  your  intimacy 
and  friendship,  if  they  are  not  bestowed  upon  persons  altogether  irre- 
proachable and  trustworthy,  may  have  upon  the  public?  The  choice  of 
friends  is  exceedingly  difficult,  and,  above  all,  in  your  position,  you  should 
seek  to  bind  to  you  men  who  are  as  accomplished  as  they  are  trustworthy, 
and  totally  free  from  ambition  and  desire.  .  .  . 

"  Have  you  weighed  the  frightful  consequences  of  gambling,  the  com- 
pany which  it  brings  together,  the  tone  which  prevails,  and  finally  the 
confusion  which  it  is  sure  to  cause  in  the  fortune  and  habits  of  a  whole 
nation?  .  .  . 

"  Also  deign  to  think  a  moment  of  the  inconvenience  which  you  have 


ADVICE    OF   JOSEPH    II.  209 

already  experienced  at  the  balls  at  the  opera.  ...  I  must  avow  that  this  is 
the  point  on  which  I  have  found  those  who  love  you,  and  think  honestly, 
the  most  shocked.  The  king  deserted  for  a  whole  night  at  Versailles,  and 
you  mingling  in  promiscuous  society,  and  lost  in  the  rabble  of  Paris  ! 

"  But  while  disillusioning  you  from  many  so-called  amusements,  may  I 
dare,  my  dear  sister,  to  substitute  another,  which  is  worth  them  all?  This 
is  reading. 

"  Look  upon  this  occupation  as  the  most  important,  and  choose  books 
which  will  make  you  think,  and  improve  your  mind.  .  .  .  Reading  will  take 
the  place  of  all,  and  those  two  hours  of  calm  will  give  you  time  to  reflect 
and  to  discover  by  your  penetration  all  that  you  have  to  do  or  not  to  do 
during  the  remainder  of  the  twenty-two.  .  .  .  Reading  and  rational  com- 
panionship make  up  the  happiness  of  life. 

"  Refrain,  my  sister,  from  speaking  ill  of  your  neighbour,  which  one 
finds  so  amusing.  ...  By  ill-natured  remarks  about  one's  neighbour  one 
estranges  honest  men.  .  .  .  Avoid,  I  beseech  you,  such  discourse,  and, 
above  all,  the  curiosity  of  wishing  to  know  everything.  .  .  . 

•'  I  implore  you,  be  chary  of  your  recommendations  ;  this  is  a  very 
delicate  point.  You  may  be  guilty  of  the  most  crying  injustice  without 
thinking  of  it,  and  for  one,  often,  whom  it  is  of  no  importance  for  you  to 
oblige,  you  may  disgust  honest  men.  .  .  .  Save  your  influence  for  great 
occasions  ;  and  on  the  little  ones  courageously  resist  the  solicitations  which 
are  made  you,  and,  finally,  do  not  take  any  one's  part  with  warmth.  .  .  . 

"  Politeness  and  affability,  my  dear  sister,  have  their  limits,  and  are  only 
of  value  in  proportion  as  they  are  distributed  and  used  wisely.  You  must 
use  discretion  therein,  and  think  of  your  situation  and  of  your  nation,  which 
is  too  inclined  to  be  familiar,  and  to  eat  out  of  your  hand." 

One  must  admit  it  ill  became  that  prince  who  had  just  posed 
as  the  apostle  of  simplicity  to  complain  of  the  familiarity  of  the 
French  nation,  to  reproach  the  queen  for  her  contempt  of  eti- 
quette and  her  solitary  walks  with  an  intimate  companion  with- 
out the  equipage  of  her  rank,  as  it  also  seems  strange  to  see  that 
philosophical  emperor  recommending  his  sister  to  show  herself 
pious  and  devoted  to  the  Church,  and  adding  that  the  greatest 
infidel  should  do  so  out  of  policy.  It  was  more  in  his  role  and 
nearer  the  truth  when  he  pointed  out  the  drawbacks  of  her  con- 
stant intercourse  with  young  people,  and  her  too  ready  reception 
of  foreigners,  especially  of  Englishmen,  whose  customs  and  man- 
ners were  then  in  fashion,  to  the  great  displeasure  of  the  king. 

"This  must  shock  the  nation,"  he  said,   "and  produce  a  bad  effect 
abroad.  .  .  .  One  will  attribute  your  affability  to  a  coquetry  which  is  de- 
sirous of  pleasing  every  one,  and  runs  after  the  applause  of  the  crowd, 
VOL.  i.  —  1 4 


210  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

while  lacking  the  approbation  of  sensible  people,  to  whose  opinion  the 
crowd  always  returns  in  the  end." 

He  finally  finished  in  these  terms :  — 

"  Cultivate  harmony  and  friendship  in  all  the  family,  but  avoid  too  great 
familiarity,  and,  above  all,  the  seduction  of  hot-headed  persons  who  wish 
to  have  you  share  their  life  in  order  to  cover  up  their  follies  with  your 
authority.  Such  follies  are  horse-races,  frequent  visits  to  Paris,  the  balls 
at  the  opera,  the  hunts  in  the  Bois  de  Boulogne,  all  those  gay  parties  in 
which  the  king  does  not  join,  and  which  certainly  and  with  reason  give 
him  no  sort  of  pleasure. 

'•  Remember  that  you  are  his  wife,  that  you  are  queen,  and  do  not  forget 
the  tender  brother  and  friend  who  has  said  all  this  to  you,  who  is  separated 
from  you  by  three  hundred  leagues,  and  almost  without  hope  of  seeing  you 
again,  but  who  loves  you,  and  will  love  you  all  his  life,  more  than  himself. 

"  Here  are  the  observations  which  I  have  made.  You  were  born  to  be 
happy,  virtuous,  and  perfect ;  but  it  is  time,  and  more  than  time,  to  reflect, 
and  to  adopt  a  mode  of  life  which  you  can  continue.  You  are  growing 
older ;  you  have  no  longer  the  excuse  of  youth.  What  will  you  become 
if  you  wait  longer?  An  unhappy  woman,  a  more  unhappy  princess  ;  and  as 
for  him  who  loves  you  more  than  anything  in  the  world,  you  wilt  break  his 
heart.  I  could  never  accustom  myself  to  knowing  you  were  not  happy." 

Never,  perhaps,  was  a  more  severe  accusation  under  a  more 
affectionate  form  addressed  to  the  court  of  France  and  to  Marie 
Antoinette  at  that  period  of  her  life  which  we  have  called  the 
period  of  dissipation.  No  more  complete  arsenal  ever  furnished 
the  enemies  of  the  queen  with  arms  against  her.  We  must  not, 
however,  take  all  these  reproaches  of  Joseph  II.,  disguised  under 
the  apparent  form  of  advice,  literally.  All  the  inconveniences 
which  he  pointed  out  did  not  exist,  and  by  no  means  to  the 
extent  which  the  acerbity  of  his  criticism  would  seem  to  indicate. 
At  the  moment  of  leaving  France,  being  desirous  of  arresting 
his  sister  in  the  unfortunate  course  he  saw  her  pursuing,  he 
thought  it  necessary,  in  order  to  move  her  more  profoundly,  to 
draw  a  frightful  picture  of  the  abuses  which  had  shocked  him ; 
and  with  this  intention,  which  accorded  with  his  nature,  inclined 
to  exaggeration,  he  so  far  forced  the  colour  of  the  picture  as  to 
talk  of  her  advancing  age,  which  left  her  no  excuse,  —  her  age  of 
twenty-two !  He  wrote  ab  irato  under  the  influence  of  the  im- 
pressions which  he  had  just  received.  This  page  must  have  been 
written  after  a  conversation  with  Mercy,  another  on  his  return  from 
a  card-party  at  the  house  of  the  Princesse  de  Guemenee,  or  after 


Maria   Theresa  aiul  Joseph  II. 


JOSEPH    II.'S    REAL   OPINION    OF   HER.  211 

a  horse-race  organized  by  the  Comte  d'Artois.     He  wished   to 
strike  hard,  and  did  not  always  strike  justly. 

If  we  wish  to  have  Joseph  II.'s  true  appreciation  of  Marie  An- 
toinette at  this  epoch,  we  must  not  seek  it  in  these  instruc- 
tions, or  even  in  his  first  letters  to  Leopold, —  in  which,  while 
acknowledging  that  the  queen  was  a  very  pretty  and  amiable 
woman,  of  an  exact  and  even  austere  virtue,  he  reproached  her 
for  not  fulfilling  as  she  ought  her  functions  as  wife  and  queen, 
and  of  running  from  dissipation  to  dissipation,  among  which 
there  were  none  indeed  that  were  not  perfectly  lawful,  but  many 
of  which  were  none  the  less  dangerous,  —  but  in  those  which  he 
wrote  after  leaving  Versailles,  but  before  quitting  France,  when, 
far  from  the  noise  of  the  court  and  the  vortex  of  the  society  about 
the  queen,  he  could  judge  calmly,  in  silence,  reflection,  and  soli- 
tude, and  when  a  more  distant  point  of  view  allowed  him  to  correct 
his  first  impression.  Here  is  what  he  sent  from  Brest,  on  June  9, 
to  Leopold,  —  to  that  brother  from  whom  he  hid  nothing:  — 

"  I  left  Paris  without  regret,  although  I  was  marvellously  well  treated 
there.  ...  As  for  Versailles,  that  cost  me  more ;  for  I  had  become 
veritably  attached  to  my  sister,  and  I  saw  her  grief  at  our  separation,  which 
increased  my  own.  She  is  an  amiable  and  good  woman,  somewhat  youth- 
ful, somewhat  heedless,  but  she  has  a  fund  of  honesty  and  virtue  truly 
admirable  at  her  age ;  besides  this,  an  intelligence  and  clearness  of  pene- 
tration which  often  astonished  me.  Her  first  impulse  is  always  right ;  if  she 
yielded  to  it,  reflected  a  little  more,  and  listened  less  to  those  people  who 
influence  her,  of  whom  there  are  hosts  and  of  different  sorts,  she  would 
be  perfect" 

"  I  parted  from  the  queen  with  much  pain,"  he  wrote  on  the  same  day 
to  his  sister,  Marie  Christine ;  "  she  is  indeed  a  charming  woman,  and 
without  her  face  would  still  please  by  her  manner  of  expressing  herself,  and 
the  spiciness  which  she  knows  how  to  impart  to  everything  she  says." 

And  six  weeks  later,  on  entering  Vienna,  the  emperor  reiterated 
to  Maria  Theresa  how  much  he  had  been  pleased  with  his  dear 
and  beautiful  queen,  and  that  if  he  could  find  a  woman  like  her 
he  would  immediately  marry  for  the  third  time.  This  is  far 
removed  from  the  biting  criticisms  of  the  "  Reflections  given  to 
the  Queen  of  France." 

On  receiving  these  instructions  from  her  brother,  Marie  An- 
toinette's first  movement  was  one  of  anger;  she  cried  that  she 
would  be  answerable  to  all  that  her  conduct  had  always  been 
well-considered  and  rational.  Soon,  however,  came  reflection ;  all 


212  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

bitterness  disappeared,  and  the  best  resolutions  were  made.  The 
queen  determined  to  stop  little  by  little  frequenting  the  salon  of 
the  Princesse  de  Guemenee,  to  abstain  from  high  play,  to  spend  a 
few  hours  of  the  day  at  home  in  order  to  be  more  constantly  with 
the  king  than  in  the  past ;  and,  in  fact,  during  the  first  weeks  she 
made  a  genuine  effort  to  reform,  —  no  more  visits  to  Paris,  no 
more  gambling,  an  evident  and  delicate  attention  toward  the 
king,  whom  she  accompanied  to  the  hunt  and  on  his  journeys 
to  St.  Hubert;  the  Princesse  de  Guemenee  was  deserted  to  such 
an  extent  that  she  resented  it ;  there  was  greater  dignity  in  the 
appearance  of  the  court,  and  marks  of  deference  to  old  persons 
and  persons  of  rank.  Still  better,  the  queen  seemed  to  have 
acquired  a  taste  for  reading.  She  studied  English  history,  and 
afterward  had  serious  conversations  with  the  Abbe  de  Vermond 
of  more  than  two  hours'  length.  During  the  journey  to  Choisy 
the  affability  of  the  young  sovereign  was  remarked, —  more  atten- 
tion to  the  choice  of  persons  admitted  to  pay  their  court,  more 
reserve  in  bestowing  marks  of  favour,  more  care  to  be  impartial ; 
and  the  rule  of  conduct  which  the  emperor  had  left  was  re-read 
from  time  to  time. 

But  these  good  resolutions  were  soon  broken  ;  the  temptations 
revived ;  Marie  Antoinette  first  resisted,  then  fell.  The  Comte 
d'Artois,  on  his  return  from  his  journey  in  the  east,  regained 
favour,  and  his  influence  was  again  exerted  over  the  queen, 
who  submitted  to  it,  although  with  regret.  He  organized  the 
court  amusements,  and  was  by  no  means  always  prudent.  Dur- 
ing the  summer  of  1777  the  heat  was  oppressive.  To  escape 
from  it,  the  court  used  to  repair  to  the  terrace  at  Versailles  in 
the  evening,  where  the  band  of  the  French  and  Swiss  Guards 
played  at  ten  o'clock.  The  royal  family  mingled  with  the 
crowd  which  these  concerts  attracted  to  the  chateau ;  the  queen 
and  the  princesses  walked  there  without  suite,  sometimes  to- 
gether, sometimes  with  one  of  their  ladies  on  their  arm.  The 
king  had  gone  once  or  twice ;  these  solitary  promenades  had 
pleased  him,  and  it  had  been  his  example  that  had  authorized 
them.  It  was  none  the  less  true  that  they  were  open  to  objec- 
tion. "  In  a  nation  where  youth  was  so  hot-headed  and  indis- 
creet," as  Mercy  justly  observed,  "one  could  not  be  too  much 
on  guard  against  occasions  that  might  be  misconstrued."  Marie 
Antoinette  found  this  out  to  her  cost.  These  promenades  on  the 
terrace  at  Versailles,  innocent  though  they  were,  served  as  pre- 


DISREGARDS    HER   BROTHER'S    ADVICE.  213 

texts  for  the  most  odious  imputations  against  the  honour  of  the 
queen ;  they  made  possible  and  perhaps  inspired  the  scene 
enacted  later  in  the  affair  of  the  necklace. 

There  were  more  serious  causes  for  concern.  Hardly  six 
months  after  the  emperor's  departure,  things  were  going  little 
better  than  before  his  arrival.  In  vain  he  wrote  to  his  sister  to 
remind  her  of  her  promises ;  his  letters  remained  without  re- 
sponse, or  she  replied  to  them  only  by  evasions.  The  journey 
to  Fontainebleau,  which  was  always  a  critical  period,  did  not 
present  fewer  dangers  in  1777  than  in  previous  years:  recom- 
mendations to  the  ministers,  influence  of  the  favourites,  an  afflu- 
ence of  young  Englishmen,  horse-races,  late  hours,  —  everything 
had  fallen  again  into  its  old  course.  Gambling  especially  had 
attained  to  frightful  proportions ;  the  chief  talk  in  Paris  was  of 
the  large  sums  lost  at  faro  by  certain  of  the  courtiers,  by  the 
Due  de  Chartres,  by  the  sovereign  herself.  Not  that  there  were 
not  from  time  to  time  a  return  to  prudence  and  intervals  of  re- 
action in  her  dissipation;  but  these  times  were  only  so  many 
points  of  departure  whence  the  current  that  bore  along  the  young 
princess  took  a  fresh  start  and  hurried  on  even  more  impetuously, 
it  would  seem,  for  having  been  retarded  a  moment.  The  coun- 
sellors of  the  queen  were  distressed ;  Mercy  exhausted  himself 
in  vain  remonstrances ;  the  Abb6  de  Vermond  made  an  excuse 
for  not  going  to  Fontainebleau  ;  and  Maria  Theresa,  heart-broken, 
wrote  to  her  ambassador,  "  Perhaps  nothing  but  a  positive  mis- 
fortune will  ever  make  her  change  her  course;  but  is  it  not  to  be 
feared  that  the  change  may  come  too  late?  " 

And  yet  for  that  very  journey  to  Fontainebleau,  Marie  Antoi- 
nette had  made  the  wisest  resolutions  with  the  best  faith  in  the 
world.  At  bottom  she  did  not  care  for  gambling;  she  was  dis- 
gusted with  horse-racing;  she  was  tired  of  all  those  amusements  ; 
she  had  no  personal  fondness  for  the  Comte  d'Artois,  who  was 
the  promoter  of  them ;  and  it  was  not  without  real  chagrin  that 
she  allowed  herself  to  be  led  on  by  those  about  her.  But  she 
was  young;  she  was  lively;  she  carried  in  her  heart  a  grief  which 
had  consumed  her  for  seven  years.  For  a  moment  she  had  be- 
lieved herself  to  be  pregnant ;  of  her  own  accord  she  had  imme- 
diately reminded  Mercy  of  all  her  plans  of  reform,  of  all  the  wise 
and  firm  resolutions  she  had  determined  to  adopt  under  such  cir- 
cumstances. Disappointed  in  her  hopes,  she  had  thrown  herself 
anew  into  the  vortex  of  amusements,  in  order  to  escape  her  dis- 


214  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

appointment,  and,  above  all,  to  escape  from  herself.  Vexed  with 
her  husband,  whose  apathy  and  coldness  constantly  disappointed 
her  desires,  she  had  come  to  regard  him  as  a  character  without 
spring  and  as  a  person  of  no  consequence,  for  whom  it  was  use- 
less to  put  one's  self  out,  since  she  could  rule  him  by  his  timidity,  — 
an  error  of  the  imagination  rather  than  of  the  heart;  the  thought- 
less anger  of  a  young  woman,  irritated  and  nervous,  driven  to 
extremities  by  successive  deceptions  ;  a  morbid  state  of  mind 
which  we  do  not  undertake  to  justify,  but  which  maybe  explained 
perhaps  by  the  repressed  irritation  induced  by  her  unhappy  situa- 
tion when  compared  with  the  fecundity  of  the  Comtesse  d'Artois, 
who  was  then  pregnant  for  the  third  time.  Such  was  Mercy's 
opinion,  when  after  enumerating  the  drawbacks  of  a  sojourn  at 
Fontainebleau,  he  wrote  to  Maria  Theresa, — 

"  It  is  always  to  the  event  of  her  pregnancy  that  I  turn  in  the  hope  of 
a  change  for  the  better,  and  it  will  be  then  that  the  queen  will  of  herself 
adopt  those  ideas  which  up  to  the  present  have  not  been  urged  upon  her 
with  the  success  one  could  desire." 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

THE  WAR  OF  SUCCESSION  IN  BAVARIA.  —  DEATH  OF  THE  ELECTOR. — 
JOSEPH  II.  OCCUPIES  LOWER  BAVARIA;  HIS  MOTHER'S  DISAPPROVAL 
OF  IT.  —  ARMAMENTS  OF  FREDERICK  II.  —  FEELING  IN  FRANCE. — 
MARIA  THERESA  IMPLORES  HER  DAUGHTER'S  INTERVENTION.  — 
FUTILE  NEGOTIATIONS.  —  DECLARATION  OF  WAR.  —  MARIE  ANTOI- 
NETTE DEMANDS  THE  MEDIATION  OF  FRANCE;  SUDDEN  CESSATION  OF 

HER  APPEALS. —  INTERVIEW  WITH  MAUREPAS.  —  STATEMENT  OF  THE 
COMTE  DE  LA  MARCK  AND  OF  THE  COUNT  VON  GOLTZ.  —  THE 
TRUE  EXTENT  OF  THE  QUEEN'S  INTERVENTION  IN  THE  AFFAIR  OF 
BAVARIA.  —  THE  PEACE  OF  TESCHEN. 

IT  was  not  solely  for  the  pleasure  of  seeing  his  august  sister,  nor 
of  visiting  the  cities  and  public  establishments,  that  Joseph 
II.  had  made  that  sojourn  in  France  which,  as  Louis  XVI.  wrote 
to  Vergennes,  was  to  make  the  king  of  Prussia  so  furiously 
jealous.  There  was  a  secret  and  more  political  aim:  the 
emperor  wished  to  see  for  himself  what  were  the  dispositions 
and  resources  of  his  ally,  and  to  strengthen  the  union  of  the 
cabinets  of  Vienna  and  Versailles  in  case  of  future  eventualities. 
If  he  had  allowed  himself  to  say,  as  the  wicked  tongue  of  Fred- 
erick II.  asserted,  which,  however,  it  is  difficult  to  believe,  that 
the  king  of  France  was  an  "  imbecile  or  a  child,"  he  none  the  less 
felt  that  that  imbecile  and  child  was  at  the  head  of  one  of  the 
first  powers  of  Europe,  and  that  it  was  essential  for  him  to  gain 
his  confidence.  Consequently  he  had  neglected  nothing  to  arrive 
at  this  end ;  and  he  would  seem  to  have  almost  succeeded. 
Louis  XVI.  had  opened  his  heart  with  all  cordiality  and  frank- 
ness to  his  imperial  brother-in-law,  —  sometimes  on  the  subject  of 
the  queen,  whose  charming  qualities  he  was  pleased  to  praise, 
sometimes  on  matters  of  government,  which  he  treated  with 
clearness  and  unexpected  precision.  "  If  I  had  desired  it,"  the 
illustrious  traveller  said  on  leaving  one  of  these  conferences,  "the 
king  would  have  shown  me  his  papers,  and  all  I  could  have 
wished  to  know  of  his  affairs."  But  there  was  one  subject  on 


216  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

which  the  French  monarch  had  remained  obstinately  silent ;  and 
this  was  precisely  concerning  the  affairs  of  Germany,  —  there  was 
the  difficulty. 

Austria  had  always  meditated  an  aggrandizement  on  the  side 
of  Bavaria ;  and  the  death,  which  was  then  imminent,  of  the  Elector 
Maximilian  Joseph  seemed  to  open  the  door  for  the  realization 
of  this  dream.  Maximilian  had  no  direct  heir;  his  future  suc- 
cessor, the  elector-palatine,  Charles  Theodore,  was  far  away, 
and  without  power.  Joseph  II.  counted  on  profiting  by  the  situa- 
tion to  take  possession  of  certain  districts,  to  which  he  claimed 
to  have  rights  whose  origin  dated  back  to  the  fifteenth  century. 
In  the  course  of  1777  negotiations  had  been  opened  with  Charles 
Theodore  to  obtain  this  concession  amicably ;  and  the  palatine, 
content  to  assure  his  tranquil  possession  of  the  rest  of  the  States 
of  Bavaria  by  means  of  a  partial  sacrifice,  was  upon  the  point 
of  consenting,  when,  on  Dec.  30,  1777,  Maximilian  died.  His 
death  precipitated  matters.  The  emperor  hastened  to  sign,  on 
Jan.  3,  1778,  his  treaty  with  Charles  Theodore;  and  on  the 
1 5th,  twelve  thousand  Austrian  troops  took  possession  of  the 
district  which  had  been  ceded  in  Lower  Bavaria.  "  The  death 
of  the  elector  gives  us  much  to  do,"  Joseph  II.  sent  word  to  Mercy 
on  January  5.  "  It  is  one  of  those  occasions  which  only  occur 
once  in  an  age,  and  which  we  must  not  neglect."  And  he  wrote  a 
few  days  later  to  his  brother  Leopold,  "  It  is  a  true  coup  d'etat, 
and  an  addition  to  the  monarchy  of  inestimable  value." 

It  was  Joseph  II.  alone  who  wished  to  enter  upon  this  affair, 
in  which  he  was,  according  to  his  own  expression,  the  "  prime 
mover.''  The  Prince  von  Kaunitz  only  lent  himself  to  it  with 
repugnance;  and  Maria  Theresa,  strong  in  her  experience  and 
wisdom,  disapproved  entirely  of  her  son's  ambition.  She  could 
not  understand  how  one  could  expose  one's  self  to  a  war  in  order 
to  uphold  uncertain  and  superannuated  pretensions.  An  amicable 
negotiation  might  pass;  but  an  armed  occupation  was  entirely 
contrary  to  her  disposition. 

"The  present  situation,"  she  wrote  to  the  emperor  on  January  2,  "far 
from  offering  a  happy,  open,  and  peaceful  prospect,  overwhelms  me  with 
a  crowd  of  reflections  which  I  cannot  rid  myself  of,  and  which,  if  I  did  not 
tell  you,  would  make  me  reproach  myself  all  my  life.  It  concerns  the  happi- 
ness and  tranquillity,  not  only  of  the  people  committed  to  my  care,  but  also 
of  all  Germany.  ...  If  our  pretensions  to  Bavaria  were  better  founded 
and  more  solid  than  they  are,  I  should  still  hesitate  to  enkindle  a  universal 


ARMAMENTS    OF    FREDERICK    II  217 

fire  for  our  private  advantage.  Judge  how  many  ill-founded  and  super- 
annuated rights,  as  the  minister  has  said,  and  as  you  know  as  well  as  I,  must 
be  taken  into  consideration  in  order  not  to  occasion  disputes  which  may 
bring  so  many  misfortunes  in  their  train.  ...  I  speak  only  from  my  expe- 
rience in  politics,  and  as  a  mother  I  should  not  oppose  arranging  this  affair 
by  means  of  compromise,  negotiation,  and  agreement,  but  never  by  means 
of  arms  or  force,  —  a  method  which  would  set  all  the  world  against  us,  and 
justly,  from  the  first  step,  and  would  lose  to  us  even  those  who  would  have 
remained  neutral.  I  have  never  seen  any  such  enterprise  prosper,  with 
the  exception  of  that  against  me  in  1741,  when  Silesia  was  lost.  .  .  . 
I  see,  therefore,  no  drawback  in  deferring  the  marching  of  the  troops,  but 
a  great  many  disadvantages  in  precipitating  it." 

This  was  the  language  of  reason ;  but  Joseph  II.  was  too  im- 
petuous to  listen  to  it.  It  seemed  to  him  that  his  desires  could 
encounter  no  obstacles ;  that  the  circumstances  being  favourable 
and  all  Europe  engaged,  this  coup  must  succeed  without  war ;  and 
that  the  acquisition,  although  still  incomplete,  would  be  but  the 
more  excellent  for  having  cost  nothing. 

A  strange  illusion  which  events  were  not  long  in  dispelling ! 
At  the  first  news  of  the  invasion  of  Lower  Bavaria,  Frederick  II. 
massed  an  army  on  the  frontiers  of  Bohemia,  ready  to  invade  it 
if  the  emperor  insisted  upon  his  scheme  of  aggrandizement.  The 
elector  of  Saxony,  who  also  had  pretensions,  on  the  side  of  his 
mother,  to  the  succession  of  Maximilian,  joined  his  troops  to 
those  of  the  king  of  Prussia;  the  Due  des  Deux-Ponts,  another 
heir  of  the  elector,  protested  on  his  side  against  the  arrangements 
made ;  and  the  Bavarians  themselves,  loyal  to  their  antipathy 
against  Austria,  refused  to  accept  a  change  of  domination.  "  The 
last  Bavarian  peasant  has  an  aversion  for  Austria  and  good-will 
toward  France,"  the  Marquis  de  Bombelles,  minister  from  France 
to  the  Diet  of  Ratisbon,  wrote  to  the  Baron  de  Breteuil,  am- 
bassador to  Vienna.  Under  the  inspiration  of  Prussia,  Germany 
was  aroused.  In  France  the  feeling  was  not  less  profound.  The 
old  prejudices  against  the  imperial  avariciousness  still  existed, 
carefully  cultivated  by  Frederick  II.  and  his  ambassador,  the 
Count  von  Goltz :  and  Joseph  II.  was  not  ignorant  of  it,  since  on 
Jan.  5,  17/8,  he  wrote  to  Mercy  on  announcing  his  project  to 
him,  "  This  will  not  greatly  please  the  nation  with  whom  you 
are."  The  feeling  was  warm,  and  the  most  ardent  began  to  talk 
of  renovating  their  equipage  of  war.  The  queen  herself,  on  the 
first  news  of  the  death  of  the  elector,  wrote  to  Madame  de 


2i8  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Polignac  that  she  feared  greatly  lest  her  brother  "  might  be  up 
to  some  of  his  tricks."  The  king  did  not  hide  his  displeasure. 
"  The  ambition  of  your  relatives  is  going  to  upset  everything," 
he  said  to  his  wife :  "  they  began  with  Poland ;  now  Bavaria  is 
the  second  volume.  I  am  sorry  for  it  on  your  account."  And 
the  French  ministers  received  orders  to  announce  to  the  courts  to 
which  they  were  accredited  that  the  dismemberment  of  Bavaria 
was  made  against  the  will  of  the  cabinet  of  Versailles,  which  dis- 
approved of  it  highly. 

This  was  only  the  logical  corollary,  authorized  by  the  circum- 
stances, of  the  instructions  given  on  April  10,  1775,  by  Monsieur 
de  Vergennes,  to  the  Marquis  de  Bombelles,  on  his  departure  for 
Ratisbon  as  French  minister. 

"  The  king,"  he  had  said  to  him,  "  loyal  to  the  principles  which  have 
ruled  their  Imperial  Majesties,  will  neglect  nothing  to  strengthen  and  ren- 
der more  inviolable  the  ties  which  assure  the  peace  of  Germany ;  but  in 
fulfilling  these  engagements,  he  does  not  believe  himself  to  be  released  from 
those  which  had  previously  been  formed  with  the  Germanic  body  in  the 
treaty  of  Westphalia. 

"  His  Majesty  had  not  ceased  to  recommend  to  his  minister  to  the  Diet, 
as  well  as  to  his  other  ministers  residing  at  the  courts  of  the  princes  of  the 
empire,  to  declare  that  his  alliance  with  the  House  of  Austria  was  founded 
upon  the  treaty  of  Westphalia  and  upon  the  Germanic  constitutions  ;  that 
his  Majesty  regarded  it  as  one  of  his  first  maxims  to  allow  no  attack  to  be 
made  thereon  ;  that  far  from  wishing  to  serve  as  an  instrument  to  any 
schemes  of  oppression  which  the  imperial  court  might  form,  his  Majesty 
regarded  the  alliance  rather  as  a  means  of  serving  the  cause  of  the  States  to 
better  purpose." 

At  this  critical  juncture  the  former  energy  of  Maria  Theresa 
reappeared  unimpaired.  She  regretted  that  her  son  had  raised  the 
question  ;  but  the  affair  once  engaged,  she  exerted  herself,  with  all 
the  vivacity  of  her  maternal  love  and  of  her  patriotism,  to  prevent 
any  evil  consequences.  It  was  to  France  that  she  first  turned.  She 
had  used  every  effort  to  strengthen  the  alliance,  and  it  seemed  to 
her  only  just  that  the  young  princess  who  was  the  heart  of  it  should 
serve  to  consolidate  it,  or  at  least  to  prevent  its  being  broken. 
If  in  the  beginning  she  had  some  scruples  in  thus  involving  her 
daughter  in  politics;  if  she  feared  that  by  her  indiscreet  interfer- 
ence she  might  make  herself  importunate,  and  even  suspected  by 
the  king,  —  her  scruples  were  soon  dissipated,  and  she  brought  to 
bear  on  Marie  Antoinette  all  the  ardour  of  a  sovereign  who  trem- 


PIER    INTERCESSION    IMPLORED    FOR   AUSTRIA.        219 

bles  for  her  people,  of  a  mother  who  trembles  for  her  sons,  all 
the  cleverness  of  a  woman  of  genius,  who,  as  an  old  politician  and 
cognizant  of  the  heart  of  her  daughter  to  its  most  secret  fold, 
knew  to  a  marvel  what  chord  to  touch,  what  sentiments  invoke, 
to  make  of  that  daughter  a  devoted  ally  and  a  docile  instrument. 
There  were  no  more  severities  or  reprimands,  such  as  her  corre- 
spondence usually  contained ;  there  were  the  most  tender  caresses, 
touching  prayers,  pathetic  appeals ;  her  letters  were  true  master- 
pieces of  feminine  and  maternal  diplomacy.  She  brought  every- 
thing into  play,  —  the  vanity  of  Marie  Antoinette,  her  affection 
for  her  mother,  her  natural  antipathy  to  the  king  of  Prussia,  every- 
thing, even  to  her  hopes  of  pregnancy,  which  then  for  the  first 
time  were  making  her  heart  tremble. 

The  affair  was  as  yet  only  in  the  beginning;  but  a  conflict 
threatened ;  Mercy  was  ill ;  the  queen  alone  could  checkmate 
the  manoeuvres  of  Frederick,  who  feared  her  alone,  and  prevent 
a  rupture  between  France  and  Austria,  which  would  be  a  mortal 
blow  to  the  empress.  Marie  Antoinette,  who  hitherto  had  al- 
ways refused  to  interfere  in  affairs,  interested  herself  warmly  in 
this,  and  did  so  solely  from  affection  for  her  mother.  It  was 
her  heart,  —  as  she  said  herself,  —  it  was  her  heart  alone  that 
prompted  her  to  act.  She  was  disturbed,  uneasy;  she  turned 
pale  on  reading  this  phrase,  "  Any  change  in  our  alliance  would 
kill  me." 

Maria  Theresa  knew  this,  and  profited  by  the  affection  of  her 
daughter.  See  the  picture  she  draws,  —  the  empress  writing  at 
five  ok:lock  in  the  morning;  the  courier  waiting  at  her  door; 
there  is  not  a  moment  to  lose  to  checkmate  the  black  machina- 
tions of  Prussia.  She  counts  alone  upon  the  justice  of  the  king, 
and  on  his  tenderness  for  his  dear  little  wife.  Never  was  it  more 
important  to  keep  intact  the  interests  of  the  two  houses  and  the 
two  States  ;  the  existence  of  the  emperor  and  of  his  brothers, 
and  the  health  of  the  empress,  depend  upon  it.  It  was  necessary, 
above  all,  to  prevent  a  war,  the  mere  idea  of  which  made  her 
succumb.  What  else  might  one  not  fear?  Maria  Theresa  loves 
her  son-in-law  too  well  to  wish  to  involve  him  in  an  enterprise 
opposed  to  his  interests  or  to  his  glory. 

Marie  Antoinette  spoke  to  her  husband,  but  with  a  certain 
indifference;  she  only  yielded  to  what  was  demanded  of  her  — 
it  is  the  Prussian  minister  who  informs  us  —  after  she  had  been 
tormented  to  excess.  And  even  then  her  actions  were  neither 


220  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

sufficiently  precise  nor  sustained,  nor  prompt  enough,  to  satisfy 
Mercy.  Where  was  that  firm  will  which  one  had  a  right  to  ex- 
pect from  her?  What  eternal  remorse  if  she  should  neglect  any 
means  that  could  add  to  the  satisfaction  or  repose  of  her  august 
mother !  Why  content  herself  with  what  the  king  said  to  the 
Count  von  Goltz,  that  he  did  not  wish  to  have  anything  to  do 
with  the  affairs  of  his  master?  It  was  not  sufficient  that  he  should 
have  nothing  to  do  with  the  affairs  of  Prussia;  it  was  necessary 
to  have  something  to  do  with  those  of  Austria,  as  befitted  a  good 
and  faithful  ally. 

Nor  was  this  all.  Joseph  II.  entered  the  scene  in  his  turn;  he 
sent  letter  upon  letter  to  his  sister.  "  Since  you  do  not  wish  to 
prevent  the  war,"  he  wrote  to  her  in  a  tragic  tone,  "  we  shall 
fight  as  brave  men;  and  under  all  circumstances,  my  dear  sister, 
you  will  have  no  cause  to  blush  for  your  brother,  who  will  ever 
merit  your  esteem." 

The  queen  was  touched  to  tears  on  reading  these  lines;  her 
lively  imagination  pictured  her  brother  in  danger,  her  mother  in 
tears.  Agitated  and  trembling,  she  sought  the  king;  she  sent 
for  the  ministers;  she  spoke  to  them  forcibly;  she  demanded  a 
definite  declaration,  which  alone  could  prevent  a  conflict.  But 
toward  what  end  were  her  energies  in  fact  directed  ?  Toward 
gaining  for  the  Lower  Countries  a  guarantee  which  both  the  king 
and  his  ministers  had  already  resolved  upon. 

On  his  side,  Frederick  II.  did  not  remain  inactive;  in  the 
month  of  August,  1777,  he  made  overtures  to  the  Marquis  de 
Joucourt,  envoy  extraordinary  from  France.  He  had  his  friends 
at  the  court  of  Versailles  ;  he  had  his  spies ;  he  had  his  minister, 
the  Count  von  Goltz,  who  watched  the  queen,  who  sought  to  sur- 
prise the  most  private  secrets  of  the  royal  couple,  even  the  mys- 
teries of  the  alcove,  —  Goltz,  who  was  all  eyes  and  all  ears,  who 
spread  and  cleverly  used  the  remarks,  more  or  less  authentic, 
attributed  to  Joseph  II.  concerning  the  nonentity  of  Louis  XVI. 
"  This  is  the  moment  to  display  all  your  strength,"  Frederick 
wrote  to  him  on  Feb.  II,  1778;  "it  is  necessary  that  the 
deaf  should  hear,  the  blind  should  see,  the  apathetic  should 
act."  Goltz  redoubled  his  efforts ;  he  wrung  from  Vergennes 
a  despatch  which  Maurepas  himself  declared  to  be  "  hard 
and  bad,"  wherein  France  declined  all  application  of  the  casns 
fcederis  to  Austria.  The  queen  heard  of  it,  and  was  indignant; 
she  pressed  the  ministers,  and  obtained  from  them,  with  the  con- 


MARIA    THERESA'S    FEARS.  221 

sent  of  the  king,  a  new  despatch,  more  amicable  in  form,  but 
scarcely  different  in  matter,  and  which  did  not  stipulate  for  that 
guarantee  of  the  Lower  Countries  which  we  have  spoken  of 
above. 

Xo  progress  was  made,  however.  On  the  instance  of  his 
mother,  Joseph  II.  had  written,  in  vain,  in  his  own  hand  to  the 
king  of  Prussia ;  this  correspondence  only  served  to  redouble  the 
distrust  and  bitterness  of  the  two  adversaries,  and  the  situation 
continued  to  be  strained.  European  diplomacy  was  active ; 
Russia  saw  a  means  of  insinuating  herself  into  the  affairs  of  Ger- 
many, and  of  turning  toward  St.  Petersburg  the  eyes  hitherto 
turned  toward  Versailles.  This  power,  which  had  been  late  in 
entering  the  European  concert,  visibly  leaned  toward  Prussia. 
Maria  Theresa  was  alarmed ;  she  feared  lest  France,  whom  she 
found  cold,  should  be  seduced  in  its  turn  by  Frederick.  She 
said :  — 

"  He  uses  every  cajolery  and  advance  possible,  —  every  one  knows 
this,  —  so  long  as  he  wishes  to  arrive  at  his  object ;  but  once  there,  he  acts 
in  exactly  the  contrary  manner,  and  never  keeps  his  word.  France  has  had 
some  experience  of  this,  as  have  all  the  people  of  Europe,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  Russia,  whom  he  fears.  Let  no  one  rely  upon  the  latter ;  she  fol- 
lows the  same  methods  as  the  king,  and  the  heir  is  even  more  Prussian 
than  his  so-called  father,  or  his  mother,  who  has  somewhat  recovered  from 
her  mania,  but  not  enough  to  expect  anything  from  her  against  the  king  of 
Prussia,  even  protestations,  —  very  lavish  of  smooth  words,  which  mean 
nothing,  after  the  manner  of  the  Greeks,  graca  fides. 

"  These  are  the  two  powers  which  you  wish  to  substitute  for  us  good,  hon- 
est Germans.  We  have  the  same  interests  of  family  and  State.  ...  It 
would  be  exceedingly  unfortunate  if  the  peace  of  Europe  depended  upon 
two  powers  so  notorious  in  their  maxims  and  principles,  even  in  the  gov- 
ernment of  their  own  subjects  ;  and  our  holy  religion  would  receive  the 
last  blow,  and  manners  and  good  faith  would  have  to  hide  themselves 
among  the  barbarians." 

After  this  picture,  "  which  was  not  exaggerated,"  the  empress 
adroitly  insinuates  that  in  the  end  the  court  of  Versailles  would 
gain  from  the  alliance  as  much  as  the  court  of  Vienna,  and  that 
Austria,  if  pushed  to  extremities  and  abandoned  by  her  friends, 
might  turn  to  her  adversaries,  and  join  the  party  "  in  order  to 
have  her  share  of  the  cake."  At  the  same  time,  and  what  was 
more  menacing,  England  had  sent  to  her  ministers  in  Germany 
the  order  to  conciliate  Austria  as  much  as  possible.  This  was  a 


222  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

serious  danger  at  the  very  moment  when  the  war  in  America  had 
just  broken  out.  What  would  happen  if  Joseph  II.,  irritated  and 
naturally  little  sympathetic  toward  France,  urged  by  the  remarks 
which  were  daily  circulated  in  his  army  against  the  French,  yielded 
to  these  suggestions ;  if  an  alliance  were  established  between 
Vienna  and  London ;  and  if  they  had  to  add  the  preoccupations 
of  a  continental  war  to  those  of  a  maritime  war,  which  were  then 
absorbing  the  entire  attention  of  the  cabinet  of  Versailles?  Marie 
Antoinette,  in  seeking  to  maintain  the  Franco-Austrian  alliance 
on  the  moderate  conditions  which  we  have  just  pointed  out,  would 
be  furthering  the  interests  both  of  the  country  of  her  adoption 
and  those  of  her  native  land.  And  in  fact  what  was  the  end  at 
that  moment  for  which  French  diplomacy  was  striving?  Here 
it  is,  as  stated  in  a  despatch  from  Vergennes  to  Bombelles  on  June 
29>  I77&:  "The  king  continues  to  use  every  effort  to  the  end 
that  the  spirit  of  justice  and  moderation  may  prevail,  and  that  the 
tranquillity  of  Germany  may  be  maintained." 

These  efforts  failed ;  war  was  declared.  On  July  5  Frederick 
II.  entered  Nachod  in  Bohemia,  and  on  the  7th,  the  first  shots 
were  fired.  Maria  Theresa  was  wild  with  anxiety ;  she  knew  that 
the  Prussian  army  was  stronger  by  forty  thousand  men  than  the 
Austrian  army,  and  that  in  face  of  a  warrior  like  Frederick,  the 
military  talents  of  Joseph  II.  would  count  for  but  little. 

"  This  is  stronger  than  I  am,"  she  wrote  to  her  son  Ferdinand.  "  I  am 
broken-hearted.  I  tremble  at  every  door  that  slams,  at  every  carriage  that 
passes  quickly,  at  every  woman  who  walks  in  haste.  I  preach  to  myself; 
I  try  to  find  myself  such  as  I  was  thirty-six  years  ago ;  but  I  was  young 
then,  I  had  a  husband,  who  took  the  place  of  everything  to  me.  Weakened 
by  my  years  and  my  reverses,  my  health  no  longer  sustains  me ;  my  soul 
alone  through  religion  resigns  itself  and  acts,  but  does  not  revive  me." 

Mercy  was  immediately  advised  of  the  great  news.  "  I  dare 
not  dwell  upon  it  too  much  to  the  queen,"  the  empress  wrote  to 
him,  "  for  fear  of  exciting  and  moving  her."  But  the  ambassador 
had  not  the  same  scruples ;  he  sent  the  despairing  note  of  her 
mother  to  Marie  Antoinette.  The  queen,  greatly  distressed, 
burst  into  tears ;  she  countermanded  an  entertainment  which  she 
was  to  give  at  Trianon,  and  intervention  from  a  high  quarter  was 
necessary  in  order  to  keep  her  from  renouncing  the  distractions 
which  the  state  of  her  health  and  the  beginning  of  her  pregnancy 
rendered  necessary.  The  king  in  alarm  came  to  her,  himself 


MARIA   THERESA'S    EFFORTS    FOR   PEACE.  223 

bathed  in  tears,  and  assured  her  that  he  wished  to  do  everything 
in  his  power  to  lessen  her  grief.  Thus  encouraged  by  her  hus- 
band, the  young  woman  sent  for  Maurepas.  She  spoke  to  him 
firmly;  and  when  the  old  minister  tried  to  find  refuge  in  his  usual 
evasions,  "  This  is  the  fourth  or  fifth  time,  Monsieur,  that  I  have 
spoken  to  you  of  this  affair,"  Marie  Antoinette  replied  imperi- 
ously. "You  have  never  made  any  other  response;  until  now  I 
have  been  patient,  but  matters  grow  too  serious,  and  I  will  no 
longer  support  such  defeats."  And  recapitulating  from  the  be- 
ginning the  affair  of  Bavaria,  she  proved  that  the  condescension 
of  France  had  alone  encouraged  Prussia.  Maurepas,  surprised 
at  a  vigour  and  decision  which  he  was  not  accustomed  to  meet, 
lost  himself  in  excuses  and  in  protestations  of  devotion. 

Maria  Theresa,  however,  made  a  new  effort.  Resolute  to  bear 
everything,  even  to  the  degradation  of  her  name,  in  order,  as  she 
said,  "  to  dissipate  the  dangers  which  threaten  the  empire  and 
Europe,"  and  without  informing  her  son,  but  taking  upon  her  old 
gray  head  all  the  charge  and  all  the  blame,  she  sent  Thugut  to 
Frederick,  on  July  13,  to  treat  for  a  peace ;  she  offered  to  renounce 
all  pretension  to  Bavaria,  if  Prussia  on  its  side  would  give  up  the 
succession  to  the  margravates  of  Bayreuth  and  of  Anspach.  But 
even  these  efforts,  which  cost  her  so  much,  were  futile;  Joseph 
II.  disavowed  them  angrily,  and  Frederick  repelled  them  disdain- 
fully. At  the  end  of  a  month  the  negotiations  were  broken  off; 
war  continued  and  was  unfavourable  to  Austria;  Marshal  Loudon 
was  forced  to  retreat  before  Prince  Henry.  Maria  Theresa  turned 
again  to  France :  — 

"  Save  your  house  and  your  brothers,"  she  wrote  to  Marie  Antoinette. 
"  I  shall  never  ask  the  king  to  involve  himself  in  this  unfortunate  war,  but 
only  to  make  some  protestations,  —  to  name  and  assemble  some  regiments 
and  generals  to  come  to  our  succour.  It  is  not  becoming  to  France  that 
we  should  be  subjected  to  our  cruel  enemy.  She  will  never  find  a  friend 
or  an  ally  at  bottom  more  sincerely  attached  than  we." 

On  receiving  this  letter,  Marie  Antoinette,  whom  the  absence 
of  all  news  during  fifteen  days  had  plunged  into  the  most  painful 
uneasiness,  sought  the  king  at  the  moment  when  he  was  having 
a  conference  with  Maurepas  and  Vergennes,  and  demanded  of 
him  —  what?  An  armed  intervention?  No;  simply  the  media- 
tion of  France  to  re-establish  peace,  and  to  put  a  stop  to  this 
effusion  of  blood.  The  request,  one  must  acknowledge,  was 


224  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

modest;  the  ministers  made  no  objection  to  it.  The  idea  of  a 
mediation  which  did  not  compromise  France  was  compatible 
with  the  policy  which  they  had  followed  since  the  beginning  of 
the  affair,  and  their  good-will  had  grown  stronger  since  they  had 
learned  positively  of  the  rupture  of  the  negotiations.  Vergennes 
did  not  hide  the  displeasure  which  the  refusal  of  the  king  of 
Prussia  had  given  to  the  cabinet  of  Versailles. 

But  Maria  Theresa  was  impatient  ;  she  was  in  haste  to  see  the 
ruinous  war  terminated ;  she  took  up  her  pen  to  trace  the  most 
gloomy  and  touching  picture  of  the  situation,  —  times  were  bad; 
snow  already  covered  the  mountains ;  the  armies  were  suffering; 
Maximilian  was  ill;  one  might  fear  everything,  so  long  as  these 
unhappy  circumstances  continued  :  — 

"  Try,  my  dear  daughter,  to  put  an  end  to  them  as  soon  as  possible ; 
you  will  save  a  mother  who  has  reached  the  limit  of  her  strength,  and  two 
brothers  who  must  in  the  end  succumb,  your  country,  a  whole  nation  who 
love  you.  The  honour  and  even  the  interest  of  the  king  are  involved  in 
this  alliance.  .  .  .  We  only  beg  of  you  to  speak  firmly  everywhere.  .  .  . 
But  a  great  deal  of  steadfastness  and  equity  of  language  is  necessary,  and 
there  is  no  time  to  lose.  .  .  .  What  happiness  if  your  confinement  takes 
place  in  a  time  of  peace,  which  you  will  have  procured  for  us,  and  which 
will  be  so  much  to  the  honour  of  the  king,  in  drawing  more  closely  the 
bonds  of  our  alliance,  the  only  one  necessary  and  fitting  for  our  holy  reli- 
gion, for  the  happiness  of  Europe,  and  our  houses !  Not  only  the  good 
of  the  monarchy,  but  my  own  preservation  depends  upon  it." 

What  could  Marie  Antoinette  do,  thus  tormented  by  her 
mother,  tormented  by  Mercy?  What  could  she  do  in  an  affair 
where  everything  was  brought  to  bear  to  move  her,  —  her  politi- 
cal preferences,  her  religious  sentiments,  everything,  even  to  that 
maternal  love  which  was  aroused  in  her  at  the  first  movement  of 
her  child,  —  what  could  she  do,  she  to  whom  Goltz  himself  has  done 
the  justice  to  acknowledge  that  at  this  juncture  she  only  ceded 
to  the  repeated  solicitations  of  the  court  of  Vienna?  The  circum- 
stances were  favourable.  The  hostile  armies,  which  had  remained 
opposite  each  other,  but  almost  inactive,  during  the  whole  sum- 
mer, had  been  forced  by  the  bad  weather,  which  was  approach- 
ing, to  suspend  hostilities ;  two  Prussian  corps  had  already  been 
obliged  to  retire.  This  was  the  time,  if  ever,  to  intervene  to 
bring  about  the  peace  which  the  empress  desired  so  ardently, 
which  the  king  also  wished  for,  and  to  which  the  emperor  himself 
was  not  opposed.  Once  more  Marie  Antoinette  spoke  to  her 


HER   APPEALS    FOR   AUSTRIA   LESS    PRESSING.         225 

husband  of  the  affair  which  preoccupied  her  incessantly.  She 
represented  to  him  the  necessity  of  hastening  the  conclusion  of  a 
peace,  and  of  an  honourable  peace;  for  Austria  could  accept  no 
other.  It  was  the  only  means  of  avoiding  an  European  war,  in 
which,  in  the  end,  France,  nolens  volens,  was  bound  to  be  en- 
gaged. She  insisted  upon  this  also  to  Maurepas,  whose  fickle- 
ness distressed  her;  she  spoke  to  him  clearly  and  precisely,  but 
with  a  certain  moderation,  in  order,  as  she  said,  "  not  to  put  the 
king  into  a  quandary  between  his  minister  and  his  wife."  She 
desired  the  pacification  of  Germany;  but  she  desired  it  because 
she  was  convinced  that  it  would  conduce  to  the  glory  of  the  king 
and  to  the  welfare  of  France,  not  less  than  to  the  "welfare  of  her 
own  dear  country." 

But  suddenly  the  intervention  of  the  queen  became  less  ardent, 
her  appeals  less  pressing.  She  spoke  once  more  to  the  king, 
but  ran  over  cursorily  the  points  in  dispute,  and  recurred  to  them 
no  more.  Maria  Theresa  complained  of  being  abandoned  at  the 
most  interesting  moment  for  her  daughter;  namely,  at  the  time 
of  her  pregnancy.  Russia  supported  Prussia;  France  did  noth- 
ing for  Austria.  Mercy  insisted  on  his  side ;  he  represented  to 
his  royal  pupil  that  she  should  keep  herself  free  from  all  reproach 
in  her  own  eyes,  and  in  the  eyes  of  her  family,  of  having  put  off 
or  neglected  the  least  thing  that  could  remedy  the  present  ill. 
The  ambassador  became  urgent,  almost  cross.  It  was  less  a 
counsel  which  he  gave  her  than  a  reprimand  which  he  addressed 
to  her. 

What,  then,  had  happened?  Had  the  queen  become  less  sen- 
sible of  her  brother's  embarrassment  and  her  mother's  anguish? 
Assuredly  not ;  but  the  time  of  her  confinement  was  approaching, 
and  that  event,  so  long  desired,  which  the  court  of  Vienna  hailed 
as  the  point  of  departure  for  an  increase  of  influence,  was  pre- 
cisely the  one  that  marked  the  decline  of  that  influence.  Marie 
Antoinette  felt  the  imperious  duty  imposed  upon  her  by  the  new 
dignity  that  made  her  truly  queen  of  France ;  and  the  first  thrill 
of  maternity  bringing  with  it  a  thrill  of  patriotism,  she  preserved 
toward  the  king  and  his  ministers  an  attitude,  not  of  indifference, 
but  of  reserve. 

The  Comte  de  la  Marck  relates  that  the  emperor,  having  de- 
manded from  France  the  assistance  of  eighty  thousand  men,  as 
had  been  stipulated   in  the  treaty  of  1/56,  wrote  to  his  sister  to 
urge  Louis  XVI.  to  grant  this  reinforcement:  — 
VOL.  i. — 15 


226  LIFE   OF   MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

"  Before  speaking  to  the  king,  the  queen  sent  for  the  Comte  de  Mam  e- 
pas  and  explained  to  him  the  interest  she  took  in  her  brother's  request, 
and  her  desire  that  he  should  dispose  the  king  favourably  toward  it. 

"  At  this  time  the  queen  was  pregnant  for  the  first  time  after  many  years 
of  waiting.  Monsieur  de  Maurepas  adroitly  seized  upon  this  circumstance, 
and  after  laying  before  the  queen  the  reasons  why  France  should  not  take 
part  in  a  war  which  was  opposed  to  her  interests,  and  even  perhaps  to 
justice,  added  '  that  the  interests  of  France  should,  if  possible,  be  dearer 
than  ever  to  the  queen,  under  the  happy  circumstances  that  promised  to 
give  an  heir  to  the  throne.' 

"  The  queen  replied  to  Monsieur  de  Maurepas  that  he  did  justice  to 
her  sentiments  for  France,  and  that  after  the  conversation  she  had  just 
had  with  him,  she  would  not  interfere  in  the  affair  nor  even  speak  of  it  to 
the  king.  She  kept  her  word." 

There  is  some  inexactness  of  detail  in  this  account  of  De  la 
Marck;  the  incident  must  have  taken  place  somewhat  later  than 
he  places  it ;  nor  can  we  discover  that  the  queen  ever  demanded 
an  armed  intervention.  But  the  fact  itself  is  true,  though  it  has 
been  called  in  question,  and  we  find  it  confirmed,  and  in  almost 
the  same  language,  in  the  official  correspondence  of  a  man  who 
was  no  friend  to  Marie  Antoinette,  but  who  was  almost  as  well 
informed  as  to  her  acts  and  movements  as  Mercy  himself;  for  if 
Mercy  was  enlightened  by  his  devotion,  the  former  was  by  his 
distrust  and  hate,  —  we  speak  of  the  Prussian  minister  to  Paris,  the 
Count  von  Goltz.  On  sending  his  master  an  account  of  a  con- 
versation he  had  had  with  the  prime  minister  of  France,  the  Count 
von  Goltz  wrote :  — 

"  He,  Maurepas,  wished  to  do  this  justice  to  the  princess,  the  queen, 
that  she  listened  to  reason ;  that  he  had  found  this  to  be  the  case  particu- 
larly in  the  affair  of  Bavaria ;  that  then  he,  the  minister,  had  said  to  her 
that  the  child  she  was  bearing  did  not  cease  to  cry  to  her  that  she  was 
queen  of  France  before  everything ;  that  he  had  added  that,  being  on  the 
verge  of  the  grave,  he  would  not  be  able  to  serve  her  offspring  in  the  time 
to  come,  and  that,  therefore,  he  would  render  it  the  most  essential  service 
in  pleading  its  cause  before  the  queen-mother ;  that  this  princess,  much 
moved,  had  thanked  him  for  thus  reminding  her  of  her  true  duty,  and  that, 
in  fact,  during  the  whole  course  of  the  affair,  the  queen  had  not  again 
appeared." 

After  this   testimony,  coming  from  a  person  whom  we    cannot 
suspect  of  partiality,  it  seems  to  us  impossible  to  doubt  the  fact. 
Despite  the  vivacity  of  her  first  appeals,  toward  what  end  was 


FRENCH    MEDIATION    FOR  AUSTRIA.  227 

Marie  Antoinette's  interposition  in  this  affair  in  reality  directed? 
Toward  the  maintenance  of  the  Franco-Austrian  alliance  and  a 
mediation  to  secure  an  honourable  peace.  On  the  first  point 
there  was  undoubtedly  a  great  divergence  of  opinion  among 
certain  old  diplomats,  who  were  faithful  to  old  and  obsolete  tra- 
ditions, and  among  certain  young  innovators  who  were  fanatical 
partisans  of  Frederick  II. ;  but  on  the  whole,  the  king  and  even 
his  ministers  thought  as  the  queen  did,  and  in  face  of  the  pro- 
digious and  already  menacing  development  of  Prussia,  it  was  the 
only  policy  to  follow.  It  could  not  be  good  for  France  to  favour 
the  indefinite  growth  of  that  new  power,  —  her  protege  of  yester- 
day, her  rival  of  to-morrow;  and  a  diplomat  who  indeed  belonged 
to  the  old  school  and  nourished  deep-rooted  prejudices  against 
Marie  Antoinette,  the  Marquis  de  Bombelles,  wrote  to  the  Baron 
de  Breteuil,  "We  cannot,  as  formerly,  return  systematically  to 
our  alliance  with  the  king  of  Prussia.  This  prince  and  his  suc- 
cessors will  be  too  powerful  to  exhibit  that  spirit  of  deference 
which  it  is  fitting  for  us  to  find."  After  a  century  have  we  not 
too  good  cause  to  appreciate  the  correctness  of  these  previsions 
of  the  Marquis  de  Bombelles? 

Who  to-day  can  reproach  Choiseul  for  having  founded  the  alli- 
ance of  France  and  Austria,  or  Marie  Antoinette  for  having  wished 
to  maintain  it? 

As  for  our  mediation,  Bombelles  saw  therein  a  means  of  re- 
establishing our  influence  in  Germany,  and  of  showing  the  king 
of  Prussia  what  a  word  from  us  could  do  toward  maintaining  the 

o 

balance  in  Europe.  The  emperor  alone  did  not  desire  it;  but  it 
was  necessary  "  to  recall  that  prince  to  moderation,  who  had  de- 
parted from  it  against  the  wishes  of  his  august  mother  and  of  all 
the  sensible  persons  of  his  empire."  And,  in  fact,  Joseph  II. 
showed  himself  displeased  with  the  attitude  of  France,  and  par- 
ticularly of  his  sister,  at  this  juncture.  "  The  political  conduct  of 
the  king  on  this  occasion,"  he  said  to  the  Comte  de  la  Marck, 
"  is  very  far  removed  from  that  which  I  should  have  expected 
from  a  court  which  was  allied  to  us  and  pretended  to  be  friendly." 
The  negotiations  were  long.  If  Maria  Theresa  desired  peace 
ardently  and  with  a  sort  of  feverish  impatience,  Joseph  II.,  whose 
pride  would  be  humiliated  by  a  peace,  sought  it  reluctantly;  and 
Prussia,  feeling  herself  the  stronger,  being  secretly  aided  by 
Russia  and  openly  by  Saxony  and  Hanover,  adjourned  any 
agreement.  Finally,  after  many  disagreeable  negotiations,  a  con- 


228  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

gress  assembled  at  Teschen ;  and  on  May  13,  1/79,  without  any 
intervention  on  the  part  of  the  queen,  —  for  Mercy  did  not  even 
acquaint  her  with  the  fact,  —  the  peace  was  signed,  to  the  lively 
disgust  of  the  emperor,  who  was  forced  thereby  to  renounce 
almost  the  whole  of  his  claim  to  Bavaria ;  to  the  great  relief,  how- 
ever, of  the  empress,  who  expressed  her  deep  gratitude  to  the 
king  and  queen,  and  growing  more  just  after  the  cessation  of  her 
anxiety,  acknowledged  that  France  had  done  all  that  could  have 
been  expected  of  her  to  bring  about  this  peace. 


CHAPTER   XVII. 

THE  FIRST  PREGNANCY  OF  THE  QUEEN  ;  HER  HAPPINESS  :  HER  PLANS 
FOR  THE  EDUCATION  OF  HER  CHILD.  —  THE  KING'S  JOY.  —  VA- 
RIOUS SENTIMENTS  OF  THE  ROYAL  FAMILY  AND  OF  THE  COURT.  — 
MALICIOUS  REMARKS.  —  DRAMATIC  CONFINEMENT  OF  THE  QUEEN. 

—  THE  BIRTH  OF  MADAME  ROYALE.  —  JOY  OF  THE  PUBLIC  MINGLED 
WITH  DISAPPOINTMENT. — THE  QUEEN'S  WORDS  TO  HER  DAUGHTER. 

—  TE  DEUM  IN    NOTRE    DAME.  —  AN    IMPROVEMENT   IN   THE  CON- 
DUCT OF  THE   QUEEN,  DESPITE   CERTAIN   INEVITABLE   RELAPSES.  — 
INTIMACY  OF  HUSBAND  AND  WIFE.  —  MARIE  ANTOINETTE'S  AFFEC- 
TION FOR  MADAME  ELISABETH.  —  IMPATIENCE  OF  MARIA   THERESA 
AND  THE  FRENCH  PEOPLE  TO  HAVE  A  DAUPHIN.  —  MISCARRIAGE  OF 
THE  QUEEN.  —  DEATH  OF  MARIA  THERESA.  —  GRIEF  OF  MARIE  AN- 
TOINETTE.—  SECOND  VISIT  OF  JOSEPH  II.  TO  FRANCE.  —  BIRTH  OF 
THE  DAUPHIN.  —  UNIVERSAL  REJOICING. 

"  TN  the  last  months  of  1777,"  Madame  Campan  relates,  "the 
•*-  queen  being  alone  in  her  room,  had  us  called,  my  father- 
in-law  and  me,  and  presenting  her  hand  to  us  to  kiss,  said 
that  as  she  looked  upon  us  as  persons  concerned  for  her  happi- 
ness, she  wished  to  receive  our  compliments ;  that  at  last  she 
was  queen  of  France,  and  soon  hoped  to  have  children ;  that  she 
had  been  able  until  then  to  hide  her  grief,  but  that  in  secret 
she  had  shed  many  tears." 

These  hopes,  however,  were  again  deferred ;  but  at  the  end  of 
some  months  they  were  once  more  renewed,  and  this  time  it  was 
not  to  Madame  Campan,  but  to  her  mother,  that  the  queen  con- 
fided them. 

"  Madame,  my  dear  mother,"  she  wrote  to  her  on  April  19,  1778,  "  my 
first  impulse  —  and  I  am  sorry  now  that  I  did  not  follow  it  eight  days 
ago  —  was  to  write  of  my  hopes  to  my  dear  mamma.  I  was  deterred  by 
my  fear  of  occasioning  too  great  grief,  if  my  great  hopes  came  to  nothing  ; 
they  are  not  yet  absolutely  sure,  and  I  cannot  be  entirely  certain  before 
the  first  of  next  month.  ...  In  the  mean  while  I  think  I  have  good  rea- 
sons to  be  confident ;  furthermore,  I  am  marvellously  well ;  my  appetite 
and  my  sleep  have  improved." 


230  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

It  is  easy  to  understand  how  the  first  thrill  of  joy  at  these 
hopes  made  the  queen's  heart  beat.  She  had  so  often  envied 
the  fecundity  of  the  Comtesse  d'Artois.  She  realized  so  well 
that  so  long  as  she  was  not  a  mother  she  would  always  in  a 
way  be  considered  a  foreigner.  What  precautions  were  taken  in 
order  that  this  dream  might  not  vanish  !  She  gave  up  her  rides, 
her  excursions  to  Paris,  even  billiards  ;  she  only  went  for  a  walk, 
and  afterward  remained  seated  in  her  boudoir,  busy  with  some 
needle-work.  When  the  spring  came,  she  installed  herself  at 
Marly,  where  the  walks  were  more  beautiful  and  more  con- 
venient, where  she  went  out  immediately  on  rising,  and  where 
the  fresh  air  of  the  morning  and  moderate  exercise  brightened 
her  spirits  and  fortified  her  body.  If  now  and  then  she  drove, 
it  was  only  with  the  express  permission  of  the  accouclieur  whom 
she  had  chosen,  —  Vermond,  a  brother  of  the  abb6.  No  more 
late  hours,  no  more  gambling.  Her  life  became  more  serious, 
her  will  more  firm,  her  mind  more  thoughtful.  Her  thoughts 
were  entirely  absorbed  by  the  child  she  was  bearing.  She 
followed,  step  by  step,  the  various  evolutions  of  a  condition 
whose  novelty  delighted  her,  and  whose  every  advance  she 
hailed  with  delight  ;  she  was  sufficiently  interested  to  measure 
her  waist,  in  order  to  confirm  its  enlargement. 

She  occupied  herself  in  thinking  of  the  care  with  which  she 
should  surround  the  little  being  who  was  at  that  moment  the 
object  of  her  tenderness ;  she  plunged  with  delight  into  all  the 
sweet  and  smiling  details  of  maternity.  The  child  should  not  be 
swaddled  ;  it  should  be  brought  up  in  liberty,  in  a  carriage,  or 
in  the  arms ;  it  should  be  lodged  on  the  ground  floor,  which 
was  only  separated  by  a  little  grille  from  the  terrace  of  the 
chateau,  on  which  it  could  take  its  first  steps  more  easily  than 
on  the  parquet.  If  it  were  a  dauphin,  —  and  it  must  be,  for  all 
the  world  foretold  it,  —  no  governor  should  be  appointed  before 
the  age  of  five ;  this  would  be  a  means  of  avoiding  intrigue,  and 
of  making  a  more  mature  choice. 

In  order  publicly  to  announce  her  happiness,  and  to  inaugu- 
rate it  by  an  act  of  charity,  she  sent  twelve  thousand  livres  to 
Paris  and  four  thousand  to  Versailles,  for  the  deliverance  of  poor 
people  detained  in  prison  for  debts  to  nurses.  A  cry  of  popular 
gratitude  should  reply  to  the  joyful  cry  of  the  parents,  and  those 
children  who  regained  their  fathers  should  bless  that  mother 
who  was  at  last  to  embrace  her  child. 


t 
VARIOUS    SENTIMENTS  OF  THE  ROYAL  FAMILY.        231 

The  king  was  enchanted ;  he  was  all  expansiveness  and  pride 
in  his  new  dignity  ;  he  surrounded  her  who  promised  him  this 
great  happiness,  which  had  so  long  been  desired  in  vain,  with 
delicate  attentions,  and  an  affection  which  was  at  last  enthusi- 
astic ;  he  announced  the  news  officially  to  the  empress.  Every- 
thing went  well,  and  despite  the  alarm  which  the  war  of  Bavaria 
caused  the  queen,  the  danger  of  her  brothers,  and  the  anguish 
of  her  mother,  she  bore  the  fatigues  of  her  pregnancy  marvel- 
lously well.  "  My  health  is  always  excellent,"  she  wrote  on 
August  14.  "  My  child  made  its  first  movement  on  Wednes- 
day, July  31,  at  half-past  ten  in  the  evening;  since  then  it  often 
moves,  which  gives  me  much  joy.  I  cannot  tell  my  dear  mamma 
how  each  movement  adds  to  my  happiness."  On  the  following 
day  she  sought  her  husband.  "  I  come,  Sire,"  she  said  to  him 
gayly,  "  to  complain  of  one  of  your  subjects,  who  has  had  the 
audacity  to  kick  me."  The  king  laughed  his  big,  hearty  laugh, 
and  tenderly  embraced  his  wife. 

But  all  the  world  did  not  laugh.  If  Mesdames,  the  aunts, 
seemed  openly  to  share  the  happiness  of  their  nephew,  and  to 
draw  near  again  for  an  instant  to  their  niece,  which  reconciliation, 
however,  did  not  last ;  if  the  Comte  d'Artois,  solely  occupied 
with  his  pleasures,  seemed  quite  undisturbed  by  the  new  situa- 
tion,—  the  two  Piedmontese  sisters,  Madame  and  the  Comtesse 
d'Artois,  while  preserving  outwardly  the  most  decorous  attitude, 
none  the  less  made  in  private  painful  and  disagreeable  reflec- 
tions ;  Monsieur  preserved  his  ordinary  manner,  but  he  wrote  to 
Gustavus  III. :  — 

"  You  have  heard  of  the  change  in  my  fortune.  .  .  .  Externally  I  re- 
gained mastery  over  myself  very  quickly,  and  preserved  the  same  manner 
as  before,  exhibiting  no  joy,  —  which  would  have  passed  for  hypocrisy,  and 
would  have  been  ;  for  you  can  readily  believe  that  I  have  not  experienced 
any,  —  nor  disappointment,  which  might  have  been  attributed  to  feeble- 
ness of  soul.  My  private  thoughts  were  more  difficult  to  conquer ;  they 
still  rebel  now  and  then." 

And  the  ministers,  —  particularly  Maurepas,  —  who  saw  in 
the  pregnancy  of  the  queen,  in  her  more  serious  life,  in  the 
tender  affection  which  the  king  showed  her,  the  assurance 
of  an  influence  which  threatened  them,  and  which  they  had 
sought  to  stifle  in  dissipation,  were  equally  discomfited,  to- 
gether with  the  courtiers,  who  had  not  been  invited  to  Marly, 
whither  the  queen  went  in  search  of  rest  and  solitude;  and  all 


232  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

those  envious  of  Madame  de  Polignac,  whose  favour  was  greater 
than  ever,  to  the  degree  that  Louis  XVI.  had  sent  for  her 
hastily  to  come  to  the  court  to  console  her  royal  friend,  when 
disturbed  by  the  despairing  and  urgent  letters  of  Maria  Theresa  ; 
and  the  vindictive  Comtesse  de  Marsan,  still  sore  agfcinst  Marie 
Antoinette,  whom  she  could  not  pardon  for  her  lack  of  sympa- 
thy for  the  Rohans,  and  her  liking  for  Choiseul,  —  Madame  de 
Marsan,  who  was  too  well  seconded  in  her  machinations  against 
the  queen  by  the  confidential  man  of  her  nephew,  the  Abbe 
Georgel,  an  intriguing  and  dangerous  subaltern,  whose  conver- 
sation made  the  good  monarch  so  indignant  that  he  wished  to 
drive  him  from  Versailles. 

All  these  malcontents  joined  together  to  undermine  the  queen's 
power  at  the  very  moment  that  it  seemed  to  be  growing  more 
secure,  and  to  ruin  her,  if  not  with  the  king,  who  was  then  in  the 
first  freshness  of  his  new  enthusiasm,  at  least  with  the  public, 
who  had  grown  more  distrustful  under  the  existing  circum- 
stances, owing  to  the  tempestuous  ambition  of  Joseph  II.,  which 
had  reawakened  all  the  old  prejudices  against  the  House  of 
Austria. 

Odious  couplets,  infamous  remarks,  invented  by  spite  and 
propagated  by  envy,  circulated  in  Versailles  and  Paris;  and  only 
a  few  days  before  the  confinement  of  Marie  Antoinette,  a  whole 
volume  of  songs  against  her  and  some  of  the  principal  ladies  of 
the  court  was  thrown  into  a  window.  Louis  XVI.,  indignant, 
wished  to  discover  the  author ;  he  was  discovered ;  he  was  not 
even  disturbed. 

The  nearer  her  confinement  approached,  the  greater  became 
the  anxiety ;  prayers  were  offered  in  all  the  churches  ;  at  the 
court  a  thousand  intrigues  were  started,  which  had  for  their 
object  the  approaching  birth  of  the  royal  child.  Every  one  was 
on  the  alert.  More  than  a  hundred  persons  of  quality,  who 
usually  lived  in  Paris,  installed  themselves  at  Versailles,  in  order 
the  sooner  to  know  the  issue  of  the  great  event,  and  to  be  ready 
to  profit  by  it.  The  city  overflowed  with  people ;  no  more 
lodgings  were  to  be  had,  and  the  price  of  living  was  trebled. 

On  December,  the  i8th,  the  queen  went  to  bed  at  eleven 
o'clock,  without  feeling  any  pain.  At  half-past  one  some  one 
rang  hastily ;  labour  had  begun.  Madame  de  Lamballe  and 
the  Honouraries,  who  had  been  warned,  entered  the  chamber. 
At  three  o'clock,  Madame  de  Chimay  went  to  the  king;  half  an 


DRAMATIC   CONFINEMENT   OF   THE    QUEEN.  233 

hour  later  the  princes  and  princesses  who  were  at  Versailles 
were  ushered  in,  while  pages  galloped  to  warn  those  who  were  at 
Paris  or  St.  Cloud.  The  royal  family,  the  princes  and  prin- 
cesses of  the  blood,  the  Honouraries,  and  Madame  de  Polignac 
were  in  the  chamber  of  the  queen,  about  the  bed,  which  stood 
opposite  the  mantel.  The  household  of  the  king,  that  of  the 
queen,  those  who  had  entrance  to  court,  were  in  the  smaller 
rooms  adjoining ;  the  remainder  of  the  assistants  in  the  card- 
room  and  the  gallery.  A  bizarre  custom  required  that  the 
confinement  of  the  queens  of  France  should  be  public ;  it  was 
observed,  even  to  its  abuse.  At  the  moment  when  Vermond 
cried,  "  The  queen  is  about  to  be  delivered  !  "  such  a  wave  of 
people  surged  into  the  royal  bedchamber  that  in  an  instant  the 
apartment  was  full ;  it  wras  impossible  to  move ;  one  would  have 
thought  it  was  a  public  place  on  the  day  of  a  festival;  two 
Savoyards  even  mounted  upon  a  piece  of  furniture  in  order  to 
see  more  easily. 

At  half-past  eleven  the  child  came  into  the  world.  It  was  a 
girl.  It  was  immediately  carried  into  the  dressing-room  to  be 
swaddled,  and  handed  over  to  the  governess,  the  Princesse  de 
Guemenee.  The  king,  joyous  and  moved,  followed  the  bearer 
to  rejoice  in  the  sight  of  his  first-born  ;  and  almost  the  entire 
crowd  hastened  after  the  king  and  the  child. 

Suddenly  an  anxious  and  urgent  cry  resounded,  "Air!  hot 
water !  "  Blood-letting  was  necessary.  The  warmth,  the  noise, 
the  lack  of  air,  the  constraint  which  the  queen  had  imposed  upon 
.  herself  to  hide  her  suffering,  the  shock  she  had  received  at  first 
when  the  child  did  not  cry,  the  joy  which  agitated  her  when  the 
child  began  to  cry,  —  so  many  contrary  emotions  had  brought 
on  a  threatening  relapse.  The  blood  flew  to  her  head  violently : 
her  mouth  was  contorted ;  the  queen  lost  consciousness.  An 
indefinable  shudder  ran  through  the  crowd  ;  the  Princesse  de  Lam- 
balle  fainted.  Some  one  flew  to  a  window  and  hastily  opened  it. 
The  hussars  drove  away  the  curious  and  indiscreet  persons  who 
remained  in  the  chamber;  but  the  hot  water  did  not  arrive. 
With  rare  presence  of  mind,  Vermond  ordered  the  first  physi- 
cian to  bleed  her.  The  queen  opened  her  eyes ;  she  was  saved  ! 
All  this  had  happened  so  rapidly  that  the  king  did  not  even 
witness  the  incident.  But  during  these  few  moments  what  anguish 
the  spectators  had  endured  !  If  the  queen  had  been  bled  two 
minutes  later,  she  would  have  been  dead.  Consequently  what  an 


234  LIFE   OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

explosion  of  joy  when  the  danger  was  past !  They  congratu- 
lated one  another,  embraced  one  another,  and  cried  for  joy. 
On  that  very  day,  while  the  Marquis  de  Beon,  lieutenant  of  the 
guards,  went  to  inform  the  corps  de  ville  of  Paris,  which  had 
been  assembled  since  the  morning,  of  the  birth,  and  while  extra 
couriers  set  out  for  Vienna  and  Madrid,  the  child  was  baptized 
in  the  chapel  of  the  chateau,  in  the  presence  of  the  king,  by 
the  Cardinal  de  Rohan,  grand  almoner,  and  received  the  names 
of  Marie  Therese  Charlotte.  Monsieur  was  proxy  for  the  king 
of  Spain  as  godfather.  Madame  represented  the  empress  as 
godmother.  All  the  royal  family  were  present  at  the  ceremony. 
A  solemn  Te  Denm  was  chanted  in  the  chapel,  and  in  the  even- 
ing a  magnificent  display  of  fireworks  was  set  off  on  the  Place 
d'Armes.  The  court,  the  city  of  Paris,  and  Versailles,  —  all  France 
was  wild  with  joy.  In  the  capital,  the  two  chief  aldermen  went 
to  the  prisons  and  released  all  those  who  were  detained  for  debts 
to  nurses.  A  bonfire  was  lighted  on  the  square  of  the  Hotel  de 
Ville,  and  the  principal  houses  of  the  city  were  illuminated. 
But  a  sufficiently  lively  disappointment  mingled  with  these  trans- 
ports. The  royal  child  had  regular  and  charming  features,  large 
eyes,  a  pretty  mouth,  a  complexion  that  promised  perfect  health; 
but  it  was  only  a  girl,  and  they  had  counted  upon  a  dauphin. 
"  Poor  little  one,"  the  queen  had  said  to  her  daughter  when  she 
pressed  it  to  her  heart  for  the  first  time,  "you  are  not  desired; 
but  you  will  be  none  the  less  dear  to  me.  A  son  would  have 
belonged  more  particularly  to  the  State ;  you  will  belong  to  me. 
You  shall  have  all  my  care;  you  shall  share  my  happiness,  and 
lighten  my  griefs." 

The  king  gave  himself  up  to  his  delight  without  any  regrets ; 
he  was  full  of  pride  in  his  new  dignity.  He  could  not  show  suffi- 
cient affection  to  his  wife.  He  even  gave  up  his  walk  and  the 
exercise  which  was  necessary  to  him  in  order  not  to  be  away 
from  her.  In  the  morning  he  was  the  first  at  her  bedside.  He 
passed  a  part  of  the  morning  there,  returned  thither  in  the  after- 
noon, and  remained  all  the  evening.  As  for  his  daughter,  he  was 
never  tired  of  looking  at  her.  He  went  every  instant  to  gaze 
upon  her,  and  one  day  when  the  child  squeezed  his  finger  he  was 
indescribably  delighted.  This  rough  nature  began  to  open  and 
develop  ;  this  heart,  so  long  cold  and  closed,  began  to  warm 
and  expand  under  the  revivifying  influence  of  paternity. 

On  the  26th,  the  queen  received  for  the  first  time  her  former 


THE   QUEEN'S   RECOVERY.  235 

lady  of  honour,  the  Marechale  de  Mouchy,  and  her  former  lady 
of  the  bedchamber,  the  Duchesse  de  Cosse.  On  the  2/th,  the 
ladies  of  the  palace  came  in  their  turn;  on  the  28th,  those  who 
had  entrance  to  the  court.  On  the  3ist,  the  august  invalid  sat 
up  in  her  chaise  tongue.  On  January  18,  she  celebrated  her 
recovery  in  the  sacristy  of  the  chapel  of  Versailles,  and  resumed 
her  court  duties  in  their  usual  form.  On  February  8,  accom- 
panied by  the  king,  Monsieur,  Madame,  and  the  Comte  and 
Comtesse  d'Artois,  she  went  to  Paris  to  render  thanks  to  God 
for  her  happy  deliverance.  She  was  desirous  of  inaugurating 
her  maternity,  as  she  had  done  the  beginning  of  her  pregnancy, 
by  a  good  deed.  At  Versailles,  six  thousand  francs  were  given 
to  each  of  the  cures  of  the  village,  twelve  thousand  livres  spent 
in  private  charities.  At  Paris  a  hundred  young  couples  were 
married  by  the  archbishop  on  the  day  of  the  queen's  entrance, 
habited  and  dowered  at  her  expense.  Each  of  them  received 
five  hundred  livres'  dowry,  two  hundred  for  the  trousseau,  twelve 
for  the  wedding,  together  with  the  promise  of  fifteen  francs  a 
month  for  the  first  child,  if  the  mother  nursed  it  herself,  and  ten 
if  she  confided  it  to  a  strange  nurse.  When  the  royal  cortege 
appeared  in  the  cathedral,  these  hundred  young  men  and  women, 
whom  the  lieutenant  of  police,  Lenoir,  had  been  ordered  to 
choose  from  among  the  best-looking,  were  ranged  in  the 
church  to  salute  the  queen  as  she  passed.  Prisoners  for  debts 
were  released ;  considerable  sums  were  confided  to  the  cures  of 
the  different  parishes.  In  the  evening  there  were  bonfires,  fire- 
works, illuminations,  fountains  of  wine,  distribution  of  bread  and 
sausages,  free  representations  at  the  Comedie  Franchise,  where 
the  coal-men  occupied  the  box  of  the  king,  and  the  fish-women 
that  of  the  queen.  But  bread  was  dear;  the  war  had  imposed 
heavy  charges ;  the  acclamations  were  less  numerous  and  less 
noisy  than  had  been  hoped  for. 

The  queen,  however,  took  care  on  that  day  to  abstain  from  all 
profane  amusement;  she  wished  to  prove  that  her  presence  in 
the  capital  was  only  determined  by  pious  motives,  and  in  no  way 
by  a  desire  for  those  diversions  which  she  had  so  often  come 
there  in  search  of.  After  the  service  at  Notre  Dame  and  the  one 
at  Ste.  Genevieve,  she  went  to  sup  at  La  Muette,  then  returned 
to  Versailles.  She  gave  herself  up  more  to  serious  reflections,  , 
and  renounced  in  part  her  noisy  amusements,  as  though  she  felt 
that  maternity  imposed  new  duties  upon  her.  The  carnival  was 


236  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

more  moderate.     Lent  was  quiet;    gambling  was  rare;  her  con- 
descension  toward  the  favourites  less  ready. 

The  pretensions  of  the  Comte  d'Adhemar  met  with  invincible 
resistance;  the  companions  of  the  queen  were  constrained  to 
observe  more  order  and  decorum ;  harmony  was  carefully  culti- 
vated in  the  royal  family;  Monsieur  and  Madame  were  treated 
with  more  consideration ;  the  Comte  d'Artois  with  more  coldness. 
The  queen  had  repented  on  the  score  of  her  petulant  brother-in- 
in-law,  and  refused  to  share  in  his  rancour  against  Necker. 

Not  that  there  were  not  still  imprudences.  Marie  Antoinette, 
recovering  from  the  scarlet  fever,  withdrew  to  Trianon,  with  four 
lords  who  were  among  her  intimate  friends,  —  the  Due  de  Coigny, 
the  Due  de  Guines,  Comte  Esterhazy,  and  the  Baron  de  Besenval. 
The  king  had  given  his  consent;  and  the  constant  presence  of 
Madame,  of  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe,  and  of  Madame  Elisabeth 
somewhat  diminished  the  evil  effects  of  this  preference.  None 
the  less  the  court  gossiped ;  evil  tongues  baptized  the  four  privi- 
leged men,  the  four  nurses  of  the  queen,  and  amused  themselves 
with  picking  out  the  four  ladies  who  should  in  their  turn  be  the 
king's  nurses.  There  was  also  that  adventure  of  the  cab,  which 
we  have  related  above,  in  reducing  it  to  its  true  proportions,  and 
the  resumption  of  her  rides,  which  alarmed  the  chief  physician, 
Lassone;  and  furthermore,  certain  noisy  entertainments  during 
the  spring  of  1780,  and  the  return  to  games  of  chance,  from 
which  it  was  more  difficult  to  wean  the  queen  than  from  all 
other  diversions. 

But  despite  these  inevitable  relapses,  her  progress  was  evident. 
"  If  I  have  ever  fallen  into  error,"  she  wrote  herself,  "  it  was  from 
childishness  and  levity ;  but  now  my  head  is  much  better  bal- 
anced." Mercy,  that  pitiless  critic,  affirmed  that  her  sojourn  at 
Trianon  in  the  spring  of  1779  was  passed  quietly.  The  sojourn 
at  Marly  which  followed  was  not  less  satisfactory,  and  was  re- 
peated in  1780  to  the  universal  content  of  those  who  were  ad- 
mitted to  the  court  there.  The  decorum  was  perfect;  the  order 
excellent.  The  other  journeys  did  not  take  place ;  Compiegne 
was  given  up  from  economy,  and  Fontainebleau  for  the  prompter 
expedition  of  affairs.  The  evening  walks  had  ceased  soon  after 
the  rides.  Gambling  had  diminished ;  the  queen  had  not  dis- 
sembled her  displeasure  at  some  heavy  losses  at  the  house  of 
Madame  de  Lamballe,  and  she  herself  averred  that  she  played 
rather  from  condescension  than  from  taste. 


HER    FRIENDSHIPS.  237 


She  suppressed  the  theatre  at  Choisy  for  fear  of  the  expense, 
and  lent  herself  with  the  best  grace  to  the  reforms  which  the 
minister  of  finance  instituted  in  her  household.  The  king  having 
wished  to  double  her  allowance,  she  would  not  accept  but  the 
half  during  the  war;  and  Maria  Theresa,  although  always  so 
severe  on  her  daughter,  wrote  to  her  on  June  30,  1780,  that  the 
charming  queen  of  France  contributed  more  than  a  little  to  the 
only  happy  moments  of  her  painful  life. 

Louis  XVI.,  who  had  been  obliged  to  separate  himself  from  his 
wife  during  the  scarlet  fever  and  her  convalescence,  —  Louis  XVI., 
after  a  momentary  coldness  caused  by  malevolent  insinuations, 
had  returned  to  his  sentiments  of  devoted  tenderness.  In  vain 
some  miserable  persons,  profiting  by  the  illness  of  the  queen,  had 
tried  to  tempt  him  to  gallantry.  His  pure  and  loyal  nature  re- 
volted against  these  despicable  efforts,  and  the  intimacy  between 
husband  and  wife  had  only  been  strengthened  by  them.  There 
seemed  on  both  their  parts  to  be  but  a  rivalry  of  attentions  and 
mutual  affability.  The  queen  accompanied  her  husband  to  St. 
Hubert;  the  king  accompanied  his  wife  to  Trianon,  and  went  to 
pass  the  evening  with  her  at  the  house  of  Madame  de  Polignac. 

The  countess  was  always  the  one  among  the  friends  of  Marie 
Antoinette  whose  favour  was  the  most  durable.  The  queen  could 
judge  severely,  and  generally  with  correctness,  of  the  other  per- 
sons of  her  set;  concerning  her  she  would  hear  nothing.  She 
passed  hours  and  whole  days  in  her  company.  Madame  de 
Polignac's  influence,  which  seemed  for  an  instant,  if  not  shaken, 
at  least  shared  by  the  Princess  Charlotte  of  Lorraine,  daughter 
of  the  Comtesse  de  Brionne,  continued  steadfast,  braving  all 
criticism,  and  defying  all  attacks. 

Another  friendship,  less  lively  than  this  one,  but  more  profound, 
perhaps,  was  begun  at  this  time,  which,  after  some  momentary 
eclipses  due  to  the  perfidious  insinuations  of  the  old  aunts,  was 
to  be  revived  in  the  hour  of  adversity,  —  that  for  the  sister  of 
Louis  XVI.,  the  amiable  and  pious  Madame  Elisabeth.  On  the 
departure  of  Madame  Clotilde  the  young  princess  had  exhibited 
a  sensibility  which  had  touched  Marie  Antoinette.  "  She  was  a 
charming  child,1'  she  said,  "who  had  intelligence,  character,  and 
much  grace."  The  child  had  grown  up ;  she  was  an  agreeable 
young  girl,  full  of  enthusiasm  and  gayety.  The  queen  had  taken 
her  with  her  to  Trianon ;  she  had  been  delighted  with  her,  and 
on  her  return  said  to  every  one  that  "  there  was  no  one  more 


238  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

amiable  than  her  little  sister-in-law ;  that  she  did  not  know  her 
very  well  as  yet,  but  that  she  had  made  a  friend  of  her,  and  that 
it  would  be  for  life."  She  kept  her  word,  and  after  that  epoch 
Madame  Elisabeth  always  accompanied  her  in  the  journeys  to 
Trianon.  But  the  person  who  had  the  greatest  attraction  for  the 
queen  was  her  daughter.  She  rejoiced  in  the  child  with  all  the 
ardour  and  vivacity  of  a  first  attachment.  She  went  to  see  her 
every  hour  of  the  day,  supervised  the  care  bestowed  upon  her, 
following  with  an  attentive  eye  her  physical  development,  de- 
lighted to  see  her  grow,  smiling  at  her  first  steps  and  words, 
pleased  that  she  first  stammered  "  papa,"  —  for  she  said  it  would 
be  a  bond  the  more  for  the  king,  — still  more  pleased,  perhaps, 
when  the  child,  who  was  beginning  to  walk,  ran  to  her  holding  out 
its  arms,  and  never  tired  of  talking  of  her  daughter  in  her  letters 
to  the  empress ;  and  a  little  later,  when  the  process  of  teething  had 
brought  on  an  attack  of  fever,  remaining  at  her  bedside  for  whole 
hours,  and  only  consenting  to  join  in  the  amusements  of  the  court 
on  the  positive  assurance  of  the  physician,  and  the  formal  desire 
of  the  king;  a  mother  in  the  full  acceptation  of  the  term,  with  a 
mother's  tenderness,  alarms,  little  happinesses,  and  previsions. 
The  education  of  her  daughter  was  the  constant  object  of  her 
thought.  This  woman  who  every  one  thought  was  only  occupied 
with  amusements  and  frivolities,  had  meditated  upon  the  infi- 
nite difficulty  and  delicacy  of  the  education  of  children  of  royal 
race. 

If  inexorable  tradition  did  not  allow  her  to  change  the  governess, 
who  seemed  ill  fitted  for  her  high  position,  the  queen  at  least 
promised  herself  to  supplement  the  insufficiency  of  that  governess, 
and  from  the  start  traced  a  plan  which  Mercy  described  "  as  very 
wise  and  well  considered."  She  was  determined  before  all  that 
no  idea  of  grandeur  should  prematurely  spring  up  in  the  mind  of 
the  child.  Without  absolutely  dispensing  with  all  etiquette,  she 
was  resolved  to  banish  all  hurtful  leniency,  all  useless  affluence  of 
serving-people,  every  appearance  likely  to  give  rise  to  sentiments 
of  pride.  Marie  Antoinette  was  faithful  to  this  plan,  and  under 
the  eyes  of  her  father  and  mother  Marie  Therese  Charlotte  grew  up 
in  the  practice  of  strong  and  Christian  virtue. 

But  a  dauphin  was  necessary.  "  We  hope  that  the  queen  may 
conduct  herself  better  next  year,"  a  lady  had  written  on  the  day 
following  the  birth  of  Madame  Royale.  Poets  dwelt  upon  the 
subject.  The  Comtesse  Fannie  de  Beauharnais,  who,  it  seems,  had 


DESIRE    FOR   A   DAUPHIN.  239 

predicted  to  the  young  sovereign  the  birth  of  a  son,  repaired  her 
error  in  these  couplets  :  — 

"Yes;  as  blundering  sibyl  for  mercy  I  sue. 
But  if  my  prediction  has  failed  to  come  true, 
I  am  fain  to  admit  in  turning  the  book, 
For  leaflet  the  second  the  first  I  mistook." 

And  the  poet  Imbert,  taking  up  the  same  thought,  composed 
the  following  four  lines,  which  ran  over  Paris :  — • 

"  To  thee,  O  France  !  a  dauphin  shall  be  born. 

As  harbinger  a  princess  doth  appear: 
For  when  you  see  a  Grace  to  earth  return, 
You  may  be  sure  that  Cupid  too  is  near." 

These  hopes  were  again  disappointed. 

Some  months  after  the  birth  of  Madame,  the  queen  became 
pregnant ;  but  on  raising  the  window  of  her  carriage,  she  strained 
herself,  and  a  week  after  had  a  miscarriage.  She  was  greatly 
grieved  at  it,  and  wept  bitterly;  the  king  passed  the  whole 
morning  by  her  bed,  exhibiting  the  most  touching  affection, 
taking  her  in  his  arms,  and  mingling  his  tears  with  hers. 

Maria  Theresa  was  not  less  distressed  than  Marie  Antoinette; 
she  was  impatient  to  have  a  grandson.  As  mother,  she  ardently 
desired  an  event  which  would  have  crowned  the  happiness  of 
her  daughter;  as  politician,  she  felt  that  the  birth  of  a  dauphin, 
in  giving  satisfaction  to  the  country  and  fulfilling  the  wishes  of 
the  king,  would  definitely  assure  the  power  of  the  queen.  She 
returned  to  the  subject  constantly,  in  her  letters  either  to  Mercy 
or  to  Marie  Antoinette,  even  to  the  point  of  importunity.  It 
was  the  subject  of  her  reiterated  recommendations.  It  was  her 
first  wish  for  a  Happy  New  Year;  it  was  almost  a  fixed  idea. 
The  empress  came  to  lecture  the  queen,  and  in  a  way  to  hold 
her  responsible  for  the  adjournment  of  her  hopes.  "  We  must 
have  a  dauphin,"  she  repeated  incessantly,  with  that  insistence 
and  haste  to  enjoy  which  old  people  display  who  feel  their  lives 
passing  away. 

"  Impatience  consumes  me ;  my  age  does  not  allow  me  to  wait. 
Until  now  I  have  been  discreet;  but  I  shall  become  impor- 
tunate in  the  end ;  it  would  be  a  murder  not  to  give  more 
children  to  that  race."  And  a  month  later,  tired  of  being  dis- 
appointed in  her  desires,  she  wrote  again,  "  No  appearance  of 
pregnancy;  I  am  in  despair;  we  must  have  a  dauphin.  ...  In 
order  to  insure  your  happiness  and  that  of  France,  it  must  be." 


240  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

It  was  to  be;  but  Maria  Theresa  was  not  to  see  it.  Her  health, 
undermined  by  so  many  fatigues,  so  many  maternal  and  political 
anxieties,  so  many  cares  of  all  kinds,  failed  visibly.  For  a  long 
time  she  had  suffered  from  catarrh  ;  it  seemed  as  though  an  in- 
ternal fire  consumed  her.  On  Nov.  24,  1780,  she  fell  quite  ill. 
Violent  attacks  of  coughing,  and  continual  suffocation,  forced 
her  to  leave  her  bed.  The  physician  who  was  called  did  not 
deceive  her;  he  urged  the  empress  to  receive  the  last  sacra- 
ments. On  the  instances  of  the  emperor,  extreme  unction  was 
deferred;  but  on  the  25th  the  invalid  confessed;  on  the  26th 
the  nuncio  brought  her  the  viaticum.  Maria  Theresa  received 
it  kneeling  upon  her  prie-Dien,  her  head  covered  with  a  mourn- 
ing veil,  as  on  Ash  Wednesday.  This  woman,  who  was  truly 
strong,  did  not  wish  that  death  should  find  her  in  bed.  On  the 
28th,  after  extreme  unction  had  been  administered,  she  remained 
alone  with  the  emperor,  gave  him  her  benediction  for  his  absent 
brothers  and  sisters,  wrote  much,  discussed  various  questions, 
gave  orders  for  her  burial,  thinking  of  everything  during  those 
last  hours,  —  of  her  children,  of  her  subjects,  of  her  affairs, 
arranging  them  even  to  the  least  details,  giving  Joseph  II.  ad- 
vice on  the  administration  of  his  vast  empire,  talking  to  Maxi- 
milian of  his  future,  to  the  Archduchess  Marianne  of  her 
vocation,  preserving  to  the  end  the  clearness  of  her  mind  and 
the  vigour  of  her  character.  And  following  with  a  calm  eye 
and  tranquil  heart  the  progress  of  death  as  it  approached,  "  I 
have  always  desired  to  die  thus,"  she  said,  "  but  I  was  afraid  that 
it  might  not  be  granted  to  me.  I  see  now  that  everything  is 
possible  with  the  grace  of  God."  She  passed  a  frightful  night, 
suffering  from  terrible  attacks  of  suffocation,  when  they  ex- 
pected to  see  her  die  at  any  moment.  After  one  of  these 
crises  she  seemed  sleepy,  but  fought  against  it.  Her  children 
urged  her  to  yield.  "  How  can  you  wish  me  to  sleep,"  she  said, 
"when  at  any  instant  I  may  be  called  before  my  Judge?  I  am 
afraid  to  go  to  sleep ;  I  do  not  wish  to  be  surprised ;  I  wish  to 
see  the  advent  of  death."  When  she  felt  her  last  hour  approach, 
she  sent  away  her  daughters,  not  wishing  to  have  them  see  her 
die.  Then  suddenly  she  rose  from  her  armchair,  took  a  few 
steps  toward  her  cliaise  tongue,  and  fell ;  they  stretched  her  out 
upon  it  as  comfortably  as  possible.  The  emperor  said  to  her, 
"You  are  worse."  ..."  Bad  enough  to  die,"  she  replied.  Then 
addressing  her  physician,  "  Light  the  mortuary  candle,"  she 


DEATH    OF   MARIA   THERESA.  241 

said,  "  and  close  my  eyes;  for  that  would  be  too  much  to  ask  of 
the  emperor."  Joseph  II.,  Maximilian,  the  Prince  Albert  of 
Saxony,  knelt  around  her.  All  was  over. 

Thus  died  on  Nov.  29,  1780,  at  the  age  of  sixty-three,  in  the 
full  plenitude  of  her  faculties,  a  great  sovereign  and  a  good 
Christian,  —  Maria  Theresa  of  Austria,  empress  of  Germany, 
and  last  heir  of  the  Hapsburgs. 

It  is  related  that  in  the  last  benediction  which  she  gave  to  all 
her  children,  present  and  absent,  when  she  pronounced  the  name 
of  Marie  Antoinette  her  voice  softened  and  her  eyes  filled  with 
tears.  Had  she  in  that  last  hour  a  sudden  intuition  of  the  bloody 
future  awaiting  that  princess  who  was  then  so  envied?  Or  on 
reviewing  rapidly  the  ten  years  that  had  passed  since  the  day 
when  the  archduchess  left  Vienna,  gracious  and  smiling  at  life, 
and  contemplating,  with  that  clear  view  which  approaching  death 
gives  to  all,  the  harm  which  successive  influences  —  her  own  at 
times  too  readily  accepted  —  had  done  to  that  young  woman, 
did  she  understand  the  dangers  which  were  about  to  assail  her, 
did  she  seek  to  dissipate  these  dangers  in  the  last  letter,  which, 
if  we  may  believe  Weber  and  the  Count  von  Goltz,  she  dictated 
on  the  very  day  of  her  death  to  the  queen  of  France?  These 
are  secrets  of  the  grave  ;  but  it  would  seem,  indeed,  that  a  threat- 
ening cloud  had  veiled  the  radiant  horizon  of  eternity  from  the 
great  sovereign. 

There  was  but  one  cry  at  the  news  of  the  death  of  Maria 
Theresa,  —  a  cry  of  veneration  and  of  praise  for  the  great  soul 
that  had  quitted  the  earth.  At  Paris,  despite  the  prejudices 
against  the  House  of  Austria,  there  was  a  general  expression  of 
respect  and  regret.  Maria  Theresa  loved  France,  and  at  bottom 
she  was  admired  and  loved  there.  The  king,  who  had  only  a 
mediocre  sympathy  for  his  brother-in-law,  felt  profound  consid- 
eration and  filial  reverence  for  his  mother-in-law.  In  Germany 
the  emotion  was  extreme;  Frederick  II.  himself,  the  implacable 
adversary  of  the  empress,  joined  in  the  universal  homage:  "I 
shed  sincere  tears  on  her  death,"  he  wrote  to  D'Alembert;  "she 
was  an  honour  to  her  sex  and  to  the  throne.  I  have  waged  war 
against  her,  but  I  have  never  been  her  enemy." 

The  terrible  news  reached  Versailles  on  Wednesday  evening, 

December  6,  but  Louis  XVI.  had  not  the  courage  himself  to 

announce  it  to  Marie  Antoinette  ;   he  confided  this  sad  duty  to  the 

Abbe  de  Vermond,  and  only  went  to  his  wife  a  quarter  of  an 

VOL.  i.  —  16 


242  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

hour  after  the  melancholy  messenger.  The  queen's  grief  was 
frightful;  the  violence  of  the  blow  even  brought  on  a  slight 
hemorrhage,  which  gave  rise  to  much  disquietude.  The  young 
woman  immediately  assumed  mourning  of  respect,  while  waiting 
for  the  court  to  put  on  its  official  mourning.  She  withdrew  to 
her  rooms  to  give  free  vent  to  her  tears,  and  remained  shut  up 
there  during  twelve  days,  only  leaving  them  to  go  to  mass,  and 
only  admitting  the  royal  family,  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe,  and 
the  Duchesse  de  Polignac,  caring  to  talk  only  of  her  mother,  of 
her  virtues,  of  her  counsels,  and  of  her  example,  and  giving  ex- 
pression to  her  grief  in  the  following  letter,  addressed  on  De- 
cember 10,  to  Joseph  II. :  — 

"  Stricken  with  this  awful  misfortune,  it  is  only  in  tears  that  I  can  write 
you.  Oh,  my  brother !  oh,  my  friend  !  no  one  remains  to  me  but  you, 
in  the  country  which  will  always  be  dear  to  me.  Be  careful,  take  care  of 
yourself;  you  owe  it  to  us  all.  There  is  no  one  but  you  to  whom  I  can 
commend  my  sisters.  They  have  lost  even  more  than  I.  They  will  be 
very  unhappy  !  Adieu,  adieu  !  I  cannot  see  what  I  write.  Remember 
that  we  are  your  friends,  your  allies ;  love  me.  I  embrace  you." 

This  dear  brother  returned  again  to  France  during  the  summer 
of  1781,  but  only  to  make  an  exceedingly  short  sojourn,  in  the 
strictest  incognito.  The  queen  was  none  the  less  happy  to  see 
him  again.  He  seemed  like  the  echo  of  the  last  words,  the  ex- 
pression of  the  last  wishes  of  a  mother  whom  she  still  mourned. 
When  he  departed  at  the  end  of  a  few  days,  on  August  5,  well 
pleased  with  his  visit,  and  on  finding  in  the  king  and  queen  a 
considerable  change  for  the  better,  she  could  not  hide  her  sor- 
row, and  the  courtiers  saw  her  hide  her  face  under  her  hat  to 
weep. 

Maternity  alone  could  console  her  for  these  repeated  blows 
of  misfortune.  God  was  finally  to  send  her  that  dauphin  so  ar- 
dently and  so  long  desired.  From  the  month  of  April,  the  preg- 
nancy of  the  queen  had  been  announced.  Her  health  continued 
excellent  during  the  entire  summer,  and  this  time  she  counted 
with  certainty  upon  a  son.  "  My  health  is  perfect ;  I  am  grow- 
ing very  large,"  she  wrote  to  her  friend,  Princess  Louise  of  Hesse- 
Darmstadt.  "  Your  sorcery  is  very  kind  to  promise  me  a  boy. 
I  have  great  faith  in  it,  and  I  do  not  doubt  of  its  coming  true." 

It  was  on  October  22  that  this  happiness  was  granted  her. 
The  preceding  night  had  been  comfortably  passed.  On  the  22d, 


THE   BIRTH    OF  THE    DAUPHIN.  243 

on  wakening,  the  queen  felt  some  pain ;  she  none  the  less  took  a 
bath ;  but  the  king,  who  was  to  go  to  shoot  at  Sacle,  counter- 
manded the  hunt.  Between  twelve  and  half-past,  her  pain  in- 
creased ;  at  a  quarter  past  one  the  dauphin  was  born.  In  order 
to  prevent  a  repetition  of  the  accident  which  had  occurred  at 
the  birth  of  Madame,  it  had  been  decided  that  the  crowd  should 
not  be  allowed  to  invade  the  royal  apartment,  and  that  the 
mother  should  not  know  the  sex  of  the  child  until  all  danger 
was  past.  On  learning  the  news  at  half-past  eleven,  Madame 
de  Polignac  had  run  to  the  queen;  but  the  other  persons  who 
ran  there  with  equal  haste — the  ladies  of  the  palace  in  the 
greatest  undress,  the  men  as  they  were  —  had  found  the  door 
closed.  Only  Monsieur,  the  Comte  d'Artois,  Mesdames  the 
aunts,  Mesdames  de  Lamballe,  de  Chimay,  de  Mailly,  d'Ossun, 
de  Tavannes,  and  de  Guemenee,  were  there,  passing  alternately 
from  the  bedchamber  to  the  Salon  de  la  Paix.  When  the  child 
was  born,  it  was  silently  carried  to  the  large  dressing-room,  where 
the  king  saw  it  washed  and  dressed,  and  gave  it  to  the  governess, 
the  Princesse  de  Guemenee. 

The  queen  was  in  bed,  anxious  and  knowing  nothing;  all  those 
who  surrounded  her  controlled  their  countenances  so  well  that  the 
poor  woman,  seeing  their  constrained  air,  thought  that  she  had 
given  birth  to  a  second  girl.  "  You  see  how  reasonable  I  am," 
she  said  gently  ;  "  I  do  not  question  you."  But  the  king  could 
no  longer  restrain  himself.  Approaching  the  bedside  of  his  wife, 
"  Monsieur  le  Dauphin,"  he  said,  with  tears  in  his  eyes,  —  "Mon- 
sieur le  Dauphin  requests  permission  to  enter."  The  child  was 
brought ;  the  queen  embraced  it  with  an  enthusiasm  that  cannot 
be  described,  then  handing  it  to  Madame  de  Guemenee,  "Take 
him,"  she  said,  —  "  he  belongs  to  the  State;  but  I  shall  have  my 
daughter." 

The  scene  was  indescribable :  all  constraint  was  thrown  aside ; 
joy  broke  forth  freely ;  it  was  so  lively  and  so  genuine  that  it 
even  silenced  jealousy  and  hate.  An  eye-witness  wrote :  — 

"The  antechamber  of  the  queen  was  charming  to  see.  The  joy  was 
overwhelming;  all  heads  were  turned.  You  saw  them  laughing  and 
crying  alternately.  People  who  did  not  know  one  another,  men  and 
women,  fell  upon  one  another's  necks ;  and  even  those  who  were 
least  attached  to  the  queen  were  carried  away  by  the  universal  de- 
light. It  was  the  same  when,  half  an  hour  after  the  birth,  the  doors  of 
the  queen's  chamber  were  thrown  open,  and  Monsieur  le  Dauphin  was 


244  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

announced.  Madame  de  Gue'me'ne'e,  radiant  with  joy,  held  him  in  her 
arms  and  traversed  the  apartments  in  her  chair,  to  carry  him  to  her  own 
apartment.  There  were  acclamations  of  joy  and  clapping  of  hands,  which 
penetrated  to  the  queen's  chamber  and  assuredly  to  her  heart.  The 
crowd  adored  and  followed  him.  Arrived  at  his  apartment,  the  arch- 
bishop wished  to  decorate  him  with  the  cordon  bleu  ;  but  the  king  said 
that  he  must  be  made  a  Christian  first." 

Madame  heard  the  news,  which  was  to  remove  her  forever 
from  the  throne,  in  an  amusing  fashion.  She  was  hastening  to 
the  queen,  when  she  encountered  one  of  those  valiant  Swiss  then 
attached  to  the  fortunes  of  France,  the  Count  of  Stedingk,  \vho 
could  not  contain  his  joy:  "A  dauphin,  Madame,"  he  blurted 
out ;  "  a  dauphin,  what  happiness !  "  The  princess  answered 
nothing;  but  she  had  sufficient  tact  to  hide  her  feelings  and  to 
manifest,  outwardly  at  least,  great  satisfaction,  being  more  clever 
than  Madame  de  Balbi,  "  who  showed  the  temper  of  a  dog." 

Monsieur,  like  his  wife,  dissembled  his  sentiments.  Madame 
Elisabeth  was  so  delighted  that  she  could  not  believe  it;  she 
laughed,  cried,  and  was  almost  ill  from  emotion.  The  Comte 
d'Artois,  alone  of  the  royal  family,  let  fall  a  word  which  betrayed 
his  disappointment.  His  son,  the  young  Due  d'Angouleme, 
had  gone  to  see  the  dauphin.  "  Mon  Dieu!  papa,"  he  said  on 
leaving  the  chamber,  "  how  little  my  cousin  is  !  "  "A  day  will 
come,  my  son,"  the  prince  could  not  help  replying,  "  when  you 
will  find  him  big  enough." 

As  for  the  king,  he  was  intoxicated  with  his  happiness ;  he  did 
not  cease  to  look  at  his  son  and  to  smile  at  him ;  tears  ran  from 
his  eyes;  he  presented,  without  distinction,  his  hand  to  every 
one;  his  joy  overcame  his  habitual  reserve.  Gay  and  affable,  he 
sought  every  occasion  to  pronounce  the  words,  "  My  son,  the 
dauphin ; "  and  taking  the  child  in  his  arms,  he  held  it  up  at 
the  window,  with  an  expression  of  content  which  touched  every 
one. 

At  three  o'clock  the  new-born  child  was  baptized  in  the  chapel 
of  Versailles  by  the  Cardinal  de  Rohan,  grand  almoner.  He  was 
held  at  the  font  by  Monsieur  in  the  name  of  the  emperor,  by 
Madame  Elisabeth  in  the  name  of  the  princess  of  Piedmont, 
and  named  Louis  Joseph  Xavier  Francois.  After  the  ceremony, 
the  Comte  de  Vergennes,  chief  treasurer  of  the  St.  Esprit, 
brought  him  the  cordon  bleu;  the  Marquis  de  Segur,  minister 
of  war,  the  cross  of  St.  Louis.  A  Te  Deum  succeeded  the 


Madame  Elizabeth. 


JOY    AT   THE    DAUPHIN'S    BIRTH.  245 

baptism,  and  in  the  evening  there  were  fireworks  on  the  Place 
d'Armes. 

He  was  an  exceptionally  beautiful  child,  of  surprising  strength, 
so  it  was  said ;  and  when  one  saw  him  fresh  and  rosy  in  his  little 
bed,  rocked  by  his  nurse,  Madame  Poitrine,  a  predestined  name, 
—  a  robust  peasant  woman  from  the  neighbourhood  of  Sceaux, 
who  swore  like  a  trooper,  was  surprised  at  nothing,  not  even  at 
the  lace  and  caps  worth  six  hundred  livres  with  which  she  was 
decked  out,  but  declared  that  she  would  not  put  on  powder  be- 
cause she  had  never  used  it,  —  one  called  down  upon  that  little 
head  the  fairest  wishes  for  the  future.  The  ladies  of  the  court, 
admitted  to  look  at  the  royal  infant,  found  him  "  as  beautiful  as 
an  angel ;  "  the  courtiers  disputed  about  the  choice  of  the  future 
governor ;  and  one  noticed,  not  without  malice,  the  disappointed 
mien  of  the  Due  de  Guines,  who  had  once  flattered  himself  that 
he  should  have  that  place,  and  whose  recent  disgrace  had  robbed 
him  of  all  hope.  When  the  President  of  the  Court  of  Accounts 
and  the  President  of  the  Court  of. Aid  came  to  pay  their  com- 
pliments, the  latter  said  to  the  dauphin,  "Your  birth  is  our  joy; 
your  education  will  be  our  hope ;  your  virtue  our  happiness." 

At  Paris  the  transports  were  not  less  lively  when  Monsieur 
Croismare,  lieutenant  of  the  guards,  announced  the  great  news 
at  the  Hotel  de  Ville.  People  laughed  and  embraced  one  another 
in  the  streets.  In  the  evening,  at  the  Comedie  Italienne,  Madame 
Billioni,  who  took  the  part  of  a  faiiy,  sang  the  following  lines, 
composed  by  Imbert :  — 

"  A  fay  am  I,  and  can  relate, 

A  new  and  joyful  thing, 
To  make  each  loyal  heart  dilate : 

A  son  is  born  unto  our  king. 
This  dauphin  whom  we  celebrate 

One  day  o'er  France  will  reign ; 
May  that  sun's  dawning  be  but  late, 

And  later  set  again !  " 

And  a  poet  scarce  known  to-day,  Chabeaussiere,  published  the 
following  allegory,  which  suited  well  the  taste  of  that  day,  and 
enjoyed  a  moderate  success :  — 

"  A  gard'ner,  famed  afar  for  skill  and  vigilance, 
Disliking  fallow  land,  within  a  garden  close 
One  day  engrafted  on  a  laurel-tree  of  France 
An  exquisite  and  fragrant  Austrian  rose. 


246  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

His  work  throve  mightily  and  met  with  no  mischance. 

Enchanted  with  the  sudden  change,  the  tree 

Did  the  honours  to  the  rose  right  gallantly. 

Ere  long  the  owner  found,  from  its  exuberance, 

He  had  an  Austrian  rose  —  and  laurel-tree  of  France." 

The  celebrations  were  as  splendid  as  ingenious.  The  arts  and 
crafts  of  Paris  spent  considerable  sums  to  go  in  a  body  to  Ver- 
sailles to  offer  their  homage  to  the  queen,  and  to  defile  before 
her,  with  music  at  their  head,  in  the  marble  court.  The  pro- 
cession was  charming;  it  continued  during  nine  days.  Each 
corporation  bore  the  insignia  of  its  profession:  the  chimney- 
sweeps carried  a  chimney,  from  the  top  of  which  one  of  their 
smallest  members  sang,  in  a  clear  voice,  a  song  appropriate  to 
the  occasion;  the  butchers  led  a  fat  cow;  the  chair  porters 
carried  a  gilt  chair,  which  contained  a  nurse  with  a  dauphin ; 
the  locksmiths  hammered  upon  an  anvil ;  the  shoemakers  made 
a  little  pair  of  shoes  for  the  new-born  child ;  the  tailors  a  little 
uniform  for  his  regiment.  The  entire  court  enjoyed  this  spec- 
tacle ;  the  king  remained  for  a  long  time  watching  it,  and  had 
twelve  thousand  livres  distributed  among  these  good  people. 

The  locksmiths  of  Versailles  did  not  wish  to  be  behind  their 
colleagues  of  Paris,  —  they  presented  a  secret  lock.  Louis  XVI., 
in  his  quality  of  artisan,  wished  to  discover  the  secret  himself. 
When  he  pressed  a  spring,  a  little  steel  dauphin,  admirably  cut, 
sprang  from  the  middle  of  the  lock.  The  prince  was  delighted ; 
he  said  aloud  that  the  gift  of  these  good  people  had  given  him 
great  pleasure,  and  he  had  thirty  livres  more  distributed  among 
them  than  among  the  other  corporations. 

The  women  of  the  Jialles  came  in  their  turn  on  November  4, 
to  congratulate  the  happy  mother;  there  were  one  hundred  and 
twenty  of  them,  dressed  in  gowns  of  black  silk,  and  the  most 
of  them  covered  with  diamonds.  Three  of  these  women  were 
admitted  near  the  bed  of  the  invalid ;  one  of  them,  who  was 
extremely  pretty  and  had  a  beautiful  voice,  delivered  an  address 
which  had  been  composed  by  La  Harpe,  and  which  he  had  written 
on  her  fan.  "  Madame,"  she  said  to  the  mother,  "  it  is  so  long 
that  we  have  loved  you  without  daring  to  tell  you  so,  that  we 
shall  have  need  of  all  of  your  indulgence  in  order  not  to  abuse 
your  permission  to  express  it  to  you  now."  And  then,  turning 
to  the  dauphin,  "  You  cannot  yet  understand  the  vows  which 
we  make  about  your  cradle ;  they  will  explain  them  to  you  some 


OFFICIAL   CELEBRATIONS.  247 

day.     They  are  all  expressed  in  the  wish  to  see  in  you  the  image 
of  those  who  have  given  you  life." 

The  queen  responded  with  the  greatest  affability  to  this  dis- 
course, and  the  delighted  king  had  a  sumptuous  repast  served 
to  these  women.  One  heard  him  humming,  with  a  joyous  air, 
lines  sung  by  the  women  of  the  Jialles,  whose  lively  rhythm  and 
popular  air  had  struck  him :  — 

"Be  not  fearful,  father  dear, 

To  see  your  growing  family ; 
God  will  feed  them,  never  fear, 

Make  Versailles  swarm  with  progeny. 
Should  hosts  of  Bourbons  France  befall, 
There  would  be  bread  and  laurel  wreaths  for  all." 

On  Wednesday,  the  26th,  the  king  went  in  great  state  to  Paris, 
to  hear  a  Te  Deum  sung  in  Notre  Dame ;  the  archbishop  came 
to  congratulate  him  at  the  door,  and  in  the  evening  the  illumina- 
tions were  superb. 

On  the  following  day,  the  27th,  the  opera,  which  had  been 
recently  rebuilt,  inaugurated  its  reopening  by  a  free  representa- 
tion, to  the  cries  of  "Long  live  the  king!"  "Long  live  the 
queen  !  "  "  Long  live  the  dauphin  !  "  During  a  whole  month, 
there  was  some  new  celebration  each  day,  religious  ceremonies 
of  thanksgiving,  or  amusing  spectacles,  —  a  procession  of  the 
parishes  of  Paris  to  Notre  Dame,  wherein  one  noticed  the  cure 
of  St.  Nicolas,  followed  by  five  hundred  poor  men  ;  free  repre- 
sentations at  the  theatres ;  couplets,  concerts,  etc.  Each  one 
wished  to  distinguish  himself  by  his  zeal,  even  to  the  flower- 
woman  of  the  king,  Madame  Medard,  who  had  a  Te  Deum  sung 
at  St.  Germain  1'Auxerrois.  Charity  had  its  usual  place  in  these 
solemnities.  Four  hundred  and  seventy-four  thousand  livres  were 
appropriated  to  the  deliverance  of  prisoners  for  debt. 

The  great  official  celebrations,  postponed  for  a  time,  owing  to 
events  of  the  war,  then  to  a  grave  illness  of  the  Comtesse 
d'Artois,  were  definitely  fixed  for  Monday,  Jan.  21,  1782.  On 
that  day  the  queen  left  La  Muette  at  half-past  nine,  forsook 
her  state  coach  at  the  Rond  du  Cours,  and  went  on  foot  to 
Notre  Dame,  then  to  Ste.  Genevieve,  to  thank  God  for  the  happy 
birth  of  the  dauphin.  At  a  quarter  past  one,  she  betook  herself 
to  the  Hotel  de  Ville,  where  the  king  joined  her,  and  where  the 
princes,  the  nobles,  and  ladies  of  the  court  in  full  dress  awaited 
her.  The  architect,  Moreau,  had  covered  the  court  of  the  hotel, 
and  had  thus  made  of  it  a  magnificent  gallery;  the  arcades 


248  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

formed  boxes,  decorated  with  Corinthian  columns,  and  sur- 
mounted by  shields  bearing  the  arms  of  France.  The  royal  box 
occupied  the  space  between  the  three  columns  in  the  centre, 
with  its  rotunda  and  cupola  decorated  with  gold  vases  filled  with 
lilies.  The  top  of  the  box  was  covered  with  crimson  stuff  and 
crowned  by  a  dolphin.  When,  before  dinner,  the  king  and 
queen  showed  themselves  upon  the  balcony,  the  whole  crowd 
that  filled  the  square  and  the  quay  applauded. 

A  sumptuous  feast  of  seventy  covers  had  been  prepared.  The 
king  was  served  by  the  provost  of  merchants,  Monsieur  de  Cau- 
martin ;  the  queen  by  the  niece  of  the  provost,  Madame  de  la 
Porte.  After  dinner  a  drawing-room  was  held,  and  play  in  the 
great  hall,  whence  one  returned  to  the  banqueting-hall  to  see  the 
display  of  fire-works  on  the  new  quay.  It  represented  a  Temple 
of  Hymen,  on  the  threshold  of  which  France  received  the  infant 
who  had  just  been  born.  The  plan  was  good  ;  the  execution  but 
mediocre;  the  service  at  the  banquet  itself  left  much  to  be  de- 
sired. If  we  may  believe  a  chronicler,  the  dukes  and  peers  had 
nothing  to  eat  but  butter  and  radishes. 

At  a  quarter  past  seven  the  king  set  out  for  La  Muette ;  half 
an  hour  later  the  queen  departed  in  her  turn.  Both  of  them 
traversed  the  principal  streets  and  squares,  which  were  brilliantly 
illuminated,  and  in  particular  the  Place  Vendome  and  the  Place 
Louis  XV.  Enthusiastic  acclamations  greeted  them  along  their 
route,  but  were  always  more  noisy  for  the  king  than  for  the  queen. 
It  would  seem  that  some  bitterness  was  always  destined  to  be 
mingled  with  the  purest  and  most  legitimate  joys  of  that  princess ; 
Louis  XVI.  was  in  a  bad  humour  on  that  day,  we  do  not  know 
why,  and  had  refused  with  unwonted  severity  the  requests  which 
she  had  made  to  him.  He  had  not  consented  to  receive  the  flags 
taken  at  St.  Eustache,  on  his  entrance  into  Notre  Dame,  before  they 
were  hung  in  the  basilica.  And  in  the  evening,  despite  the  appeals 
of  his  wife,  he  had  insisted  upon  returning  alone  to  La  Muette,  in 
order  not  to  confound  the  two  corteges  in  the  same  demonstration. 
And  what  was  more  serious,  a  despicable  pamphlet,  which  was 
odiously  injurious  to  the  queen,  had  been  affixed  that  very 
morning  to  the  door  of  the  cathedral,  and  a  great  rumour  spread 
that  a  danger  threatened  her  at  the  Hdtel  de  Ville.  In  conse- 
quence of  this  the  unfortunate  sovereign,  who  had  been  im- 
prudently warned  of  these  rumours  and  threats  by  the  Comte 
d'Artois,  passed  the  whole  day  in  a  state  of  terror  which  poisoned 
her  happiness. 


THE  ENTHUSIASM  IN  THE  COUNTRY.       249 

On  the  23d  the  king  and  queen  returned  to  Paris  to  attend  a 
ball  at  the  Hotel  de  Ville,  and  appeared  very  gay,  despite  the 
mob  which  filled  the  hall  to  the  point  of  half  suffocating  them. 

In  the  country  the  enthusiasm  was  unalloyed ;  it  was  a  patriotic 
delirium,  a  chronicler  has  said.  The  States  of  Bourgogne  dow- 
ered twelve  young  girls;  the  archbishop  of  Vienna  did  the 
same ;  the  Parliament  of  Rennes  distributed  six  thousand  livres 
among  the  poor;  at  Soissons,  the  intendant,  Le  Pelletier,  gave 
a  feast  to  the  labourers  of  his  district,  and  distributed  wine  to 
three  thousand  persons.  At  Limoges  they  raised  a  fountain  and 
created  a  Place  Dauphine ;  at  Orleans  they  baptized  a  street  with 
the  same  name.  At  Rouen  a  travelling  actor,  who  was  still  ob- 
scure, but  who  was  destined  to  a  great  and  sinister  celebrity,  Col- 
lot  d'Herbois,  played  on  the  stage  of  that  city  a  piece  of  his  own 
composition,  and  sang  the  following  lines,  which,  though  but  a 
mediocre  poetical  attempt,  were  at  least  an  ardent  profession  of 
monarchical  faith,  and  of  homage  and  devotion  to  that  august 
princess  whose  kindness  and  virtues  had  conquered  all  hearts. 

"  That  the  French  might  be  happy, 
Our  good  Louis  Seize 
Has  wedded  for  aye 
The  child  of  Therese. 
From  this  happy  union 
Has  sprung  a  brave  scion. 
Oh,  may  gracious  Heaven 
Watch  over  and  screen 
From  misfortune  unbidden, 
The  days  of  our  queen  !  " 

History  pauses  with  melancholy  pleasure  over  these  details, 
which  fill  all  the  gazettes  and  chronicles  of  the  time.  It  was  the 
last  glimmer  of  an  order  of  things  on  the  point  of  disappearing. 
The  eye  contemplates  with  delight  that  intimate  union  of  a  people 
and  a  dynasty,  who  mingled  their  joys,  their  sorrows,  their  hopes, 
and  who  in  truth  only  formed  a  large  family  whose  father  was 
the  king. 

"  The  folly  of  the  people  continues  ever  the  same,"  a  lady  of  the 
court  wrote  a  week  after  the  birth  of  the  dauphin.  "  One  encoun- 
ters in  the  street  only  violins,  songs,  and  dances ;  I  find  all  this 
touching,  and  I  do  not  know,  in  fact,  a  nation  more  amiable  than 
ours." 


CHAPTER   XVIII. 

WAR  IN  AMERICA.  —  FRANKLIN'S  MISSION. —  WAR  DECLARED.  —  THE 
QUEEN  FAVOURABLE  TO  THE  AMERICANS.  —  PROTECTRESS  OF  LA- 
FAYETTE. —  HER  ANXIETIES  DURING  THE  WAR.  —  SHE  is  DESIROUS 
OF  AN  HONOURABLE  PEACE.  —  THE  PEACE  OF  1783;  ITS  CON- 
SEQUENCES.—  PRINCELY  VISITORS. —  THE  PRINCESSES  OF  HESSE- 
DARMSTADT. —  THE  COMTE  AND  THE  COMTESSE  DU  NORD.  —  ENTER- 
TAINMENTS AT  TRIANON  AND  CHANTILLY.  —  THE  KING  OF  SWEDEN. 

—  PRINCE  HENRY  OF  PRUSSIA.  —  BIRTH  OF  THE  Due  DE  NORMANDIE. 

—  BANKRUPTCY  OF  THE  PRINCE  DE  GUEMENEE.  —  THE  DUCHESSE  DE 
POLIGNAC  MADE  GOVERNESS  TO  THE  CHILDREN  OF  FRANCE. 

AT  this  time  both  dynasty  and  people  were  gaining  new  vigour 
from  those  revivifying  waves  of  military  glory,  always  so 
dear  to  our  national  pride.  For  three  years  they  had  been  at  war 
with  England,  and  the  French  standard  had  regained  incontestable 
renown  upon  the  seas.  On  the  4th  of  July,  1776,  the  Congress  of 
Philadelphia  had  proclaimed  the  independence  of  the  United 
States,  and  decided  to  send  three  delegates  over  the  sea  to  win 
the  sympathy  and  support  of  the  European  powers  for  America. 
On  December  2,  Dr.  Franklin  disembarked  at  Auray,  from  the 
vessel  which  had  successfully  carried  him  through  the  English 
cruisers,  and  journeying  by  short  stages,  arrived  on  December  21 
at  Versailles. 

The  choice  of  an  American  ambassador  was  fortunate.  An 
apparently  good-humoured  man,  hiding  under  an  appearance  of 
simplicity,  then  in  fashion,  great  cunning;  affecting  an  air  of  plain 
dealing  and  independence  which  charmed  by  its  contrast  with  the 
solemn  formulas  of  etiquette ;  possessing  the  patience  and  phlegm 
of  the  Anglo-Saxon  race ;  knowing  how  to  wait  without  impatience, 
but  also  without  ever  becoming  discouraged  or  losing  sight  of  the 
end  he  had  in  view, — Franklin,  both  by  his  virtues  and  his  de- 
fects, pleased  the  nation,  which  was  easily  content  with  words,  be- 
guiled by  appearances,  fond  of  strangers,  and  enthusiastic  over 


FRANKLIN'S    MISSION.  251 

any  innovation.  He  soon  saw  that  the  true  sovereign  of  France 
at  that  time  was  neither  the  king  nor  the  queen  nor  the  ministers, 
but  public  opinion,  and  it  was  this  opinion  which  he  determined  to 
influence.  Everything  he  did  was  done  for  the  sake  of  appearance. 
Free  from  all  constraining  prejudices,  he  went  to  mass,  although 
a  Protestant,  praised  kings,  although  a  Republican,  courted  both 
his  cure  and  Voltaire,  —  ottering  the  holy  bread  to  the  former, 
soliciting  the  benediction  of  the  latter  for  his  grandson,  in  a  scene 
which  Bachaumont  has  described,  and  whose  charlatanism  re- 
volted even  that  sceptic  chronicler.  Flattering  bishops  and  free- 
masons, salons  and  lodges,  men  of  letters  and  men  of  affairs, 
philosophers  and  pretty  women,  who  embraced  him  despite  his 
glasses;  ignoring  the  received  customs  in  order  to  make  himself 
conspicuous,  appearing  at  the  theatre  in  a  plain  brown  cloth  coat 
and  with  uncurled  hair  in  the  midst  of  powdered  wigs*  and  em- 
broidered coats;  apparently  tranquil  and  inactive,  but  employing 
many  subordinate  people,  setting  everything  in  action  (arts,  sci- 
ences, letters)  to  make  himself  known  and  famous,  —  the  "  good- 
natured  Franklin,"  as  some  called  him,  "  the  good  and  venerable 
doctor,"  as  others  called  him,  soon  became  the  idol,  or  as  he  him- 
self said,  "  the  doll,"  of  the  Parisians,  while  at  the  same  time  render- 
ing his  country  and  his  cause  popular.  The  talk  was  of  nothing 
but  America ;  every  one  dreamed  of  the  United  States ;  hair  was 
dressed  aux  insurgents;  one  played  Boston;  every  one  grew 
enthusiastic  over  republican  ideas,  and  their  representative. 

The  young  nobles  declared  for  the  cause  of  the  rebellious  colo- 
nies. The  Marquis  de  Lafayette  embarked  for  America  despite 
the  opposition  of  his  family,  even  despite  the  express  prohibition 
of  the  king.  The  Vicomte  de  Noailles,  brother-in-law  of  Lafayette, 
the  Comte  de  Segur,  Comte  de  Pontgibault,  the  Comte  de  Gouvion, 
even  the  cousins  of  the  Prince  de  Montbarrey,  minister  of  war, 
departed  to  enroll  themselves  under  the  flag  of  Washington.  It 
was  a  veritable  delirium. 

Joseph  II.,  during  his  journey  to  France,  sought  in  vain  to  throw 
a  little  cold  water  over  this  enthusiasm.  "  My  profession  is  to  be 
a  Royalist,"  he  replied  dryly  to  a  lady  who  was  praising  the  Amer- 
icans,—  "those  athletes  of  liberty,"  as  Frederick  II.  called  them. 
But  he  was  impotent  to  arrest  the  popular  infatuation,  which  even 
gained  the  court.  There  the  insurgents  found  an  ardent  advo- 
cate in  the  minister  from  Prussia,  the  Count  von  Goltz,  whose 
master  was  not  sorry  to  embroil  France  and  England,  in  order  to 


252  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

have  a  free  hand  on  the  side  of  Dantzick,  or,  if  need  were,  on  the 
side  of  Bavaria.  On  the  command  of  his  sovereign  Goltz  ceased 
not  to  insinuate  that  France  might  find  therein  a  favourable  occa- 
sion to  avenge  her  defeats,  and  perhaps  to  recover  her  lost  colo- 
nies. And  in  fact  the  temptation  was  great.  To  take  brilliant 
revenge  for  the  defeats  of  the  Seven  Years'  War,  and  the  humili- 
ating treaty  of  1763  ;  to  humble  in  our  turn  our  eternal  rival;  to 
inflict  a  decisive  and  perhaps  irremediable  blow  on  her  power;  to 
prove  that  we  had  not  degenerated  from  the  conquerors  of  Fonte- 
noy ;  and,  above  all,  to  show  the  strength  of  our  marine,  which  had 
been  decimated  in  the  struggle  with  England,  but  for  whose  restora- 
tion they  had  been  energetically  working  since  the  accession  of 
Louis  XVI.,  —  what  a  fine  and  alluring  prospect !  There  was,  with- 
out doubt,  a  financial  question  which  might  interfere.  Turgot, 
while  minister,  had  actively  opposed  all  intervention  in  American 
affairs ;  he  had  written  a  long  memoir  to  show  that  it  was  necessary 
to  avoid  a  war  as  the  greatest  of  misfortunes,  since  it  would  render 
impossible  for  a  very  long  time,  and  perhaps  forever,  the  reforms 
which  were  absolutely  requisite  to  the  prosperity  of  the  State  and 
the  relief  of  the  people.  Necker,  who  had  succeeded  Turgot, 
was  not  more  favourable  to  so  costly  an  enterprise.  But  what 
was  money  compared  to  glory?  Vergennes  visibly  leaned  toward 
an  alliance  with  the  United  States ;  Maurepas  did  not  dissem- 
ble his  joy  at  the  blows  dealt  to  British  pride.  Louis  XVI.  still 
hesitated ;  profoundly  penetrated  with  the  monarchical  idea  and 
the  necessity  of  the  principle  of  authority,  he  recoiled  from  sup- 
porting an  insurrection ;  a  man  of  peace,  he  was  not  anxious  to 
throw  himself  into  a  war;  loyal  to  his  word  once  given,  he  felt 
scruples  at  breaking,  without  cause,  a  treaty  which  had  been  sol- 
emnly accepted,  and  which  England  had  not  violated.  The  queen 
had  no  such  hesitation.  She  shared  the  general  enthusiasm.  Her 
ardent  nature  only  saw  the  chivalrous  side  of  the  enterprise,— 
an  oppressed  people  to  defend,  glory  to  be  won,  the  prestige  of 
France  to  be  restored.  She  liked  not  the  ambiguous  conduct 
of  the  minister  who,  while  refusing  to  break  with  the  English, 
furnished  in  secret,  and  allowed  to  be  furnished,  arms  and  muni- 
tions to  the  insurgents.  She  put  all  her  power  and  all  her  influ- 
ence at  the  service  of  the  partisans  of  the  war,  and  it  was  she  who 
undertook  to  conquer  the  opposition  of  her  husband.  She  handed 
to  the  king  a  memoir  by  the  Comte  d'Estaing  and  the  Comte  de 
Maillebois,  which  energetically  advocated  the  war,  and  attacked 


NEWS    OF   THE    CAPITULATION    OF   BURGOYNE.      253 

the  conduct  of  the  cabinet  as  pusillanimous.  "  The  powers  of 
Europe,"  this  memoir  said,  "  will  judge  the  reign  of  Louis  XVI. 
according  to  the  manner  in  which  this  prince  will  know  how  to  use 
the  present  circumstances  to  humble  the  pride  and  pretensions  of 
a  rival  power." 

The  capitulation  of  the  English  general,  Burgoyne,  at  Sara- 
toga, on  Oct.  13,  1777,  was  an  argument  the  more.  This  great 
event  increased  the  strength  of  the  colonies,  and  made  the  chances 
of  their  success  almost  certain.  "  The  chances  are  a  hundred  to 
one  in  favour  of  France,"  Frederick  II.  wrote. 

The  joy  over  this  victory  for  the  Americans  was  great  at  Paris. 
The  king  himself  could  not  conceal  his  satisfaction,  and  on 
December  6,  two  days  after  the  news  of  the  captivity  of  Bur- 
goyne, Monsieur  Vergennes  informed  Franklin  and  his  colleagues 
that  the  circumstances  seemed  favourable  for  the  establishment  of 
a  close  alliance  between  the  Crown  and  the  United  Provinces  of 
North  America.  Negotiations  were  actively  pushed  forward ; 
and  on  Jan.  21,  1778,  at  a  ball  given  by  the  queen,  the  Comte  de 
Provence,  who  had  just  left  the  council,  announced  that  a  treaty 
had  been  concluded  with  the  United  States,  and  that  the 
order  had  been  given  to  put  a  certain  number  of  vessels  into 
commission.  "  There  was  general  emotion  in  the  hall,"  the 
ambassador  from  England,  Lord  Stromont,  relates,  "  and  much 
whispering  among  the  young  men,  all  of  whom  were  eager  for 
war;  many  marks  of  pleasure.  The  Comte  d'Artois  exhibited 
transports  of  joy." 

On  February  6  the  treaty  was  finally  signed  ;  and  on  March  16 
Lord  Stromont  demanded  his  passports.  They  had  entered 
upon  the  struggle.  With  her  taste  for  war  and  her  thoughtless- 
ness for  the  future,  France  threw  herself  into  an  adventure  in 
which  she  was  to  cover  herself  with  glory,  but  at  the  same  time 
exhaust  her  finances,  and  the  political  consequences  of  which 
were  to  be  incalculable.  She  entered  upon  it  with  a  gayety 
which  wounds  those  who  to-day  can  see  the  results.  "  Louis 
XVI.  and  Marie  Antoinette,"  the  most  recent  historian  of  the 
war  for  independence  has  said,  "  when  they  embarked  for  the 
liberation  of  America,  Pleasure  on  the  prow,  and  the  uncertain 
hand  of  Youth  at  the  helm,  might  have  cried  out  to  the  young 
republic  which  they  fostered,  '  Morituri  te  salutant!'  ['The 
doomed  to  die  salute  thee !  ']  " 

At   the    start   all  went  well.     From   the    first   day  our   navy 


254  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

showed  itself  equal  to  the  English  navy.  On  June  17  the  first 
engagement  at  sea  ended  with  a  brilliant  victory  for  France. 
After  a  hand-to-hand  conflict,  the  captain  of  the  "  Clochetiere" 
forced  Captain  Marshall  to  retreat,  and  the  name  of  the  French 
ship  —  the  "Belle  Poule  "  —  immediately  became  popular.  On 
July  27  the  fleet  of  Admiral  d'Orvilliers  gained  a  decisive 
advantage  over  Admiral  Keppel,  which  would  have  been  a 
greater  triumph  if  the  Due  de  Chartres,  who  commanded  one 
of  the  squadrons,  had  better  comprehended  and  carried  out  the 
signals  of  the  admiral.  The  war  was  carried  on  in  Europe,  in 
America,  in  the  Indies,  with  varying  vicissitudes,  but  with  great 
glory  for  our  arms.  On  land,  Lafayette  and  Rochambeau  were 
the  lieutenants  and  disciples  of  Washington,  and  on  Oct.  19, 
1781,  gloriously  forced  Cornwallis  to  capitulate  at  Yorktown 
with  eight  thousand  men.  On  the  sea,  D'Estaing  captured  the 
"  Granada,"  Bouille  the  "Dominique;"  while  Lamott,  Picquet, 
De  Grasse,  Bougainville,  and, -above  all,  Suffren,  sometimes  victo- 
rious, sometimes  beaten,  but  always  intrepid,  maintained  the 
honour  of  the  national  flag. 

The  queen  followed,  with  an  anxious  eagerness,  every  move- 
ment of  our  navy  and  of  our  army.  "  They  are  in  the  Channel," 
she  wrote  to  her  mother  on  Aug.  16,  1779,  when  the  union  of 
the  Spanish  and  French  fleets  was  preparing  an  invasion  into 
England,  and  aroused  hopes  in  the  public  which,  unfortunately, 
were  to  be  disappointed,  —  "  they  are  now  in  the  Channel,  and 
I  cannot  think  without  trembling  that  at  any  moment  their  fate 
may  be  decided.  I  am  frightened  also  at  the  approach  of  the 
month  of  September,  when  the  sea  is  no  longer  practicable ;  it 
is  to  my  dear  mamma's  bosom  that  I  confide  all  my  disquietude. 
May  God  grant  that  it  be  unfounded !  "  The  failure  of  this 
campaign,  undertaken  at  such  great  expense,  the  entrance  of 
D'Orvilliers  into  Brest  without  having  done  anything,  but  too 
well  justified  the  forebodings  of  Marie  Antoinette. 

But  the  queen  was  not  discouraged ;  under  all  circumstances 
she  loudly  proclaimed  her  sympathy  for  America,  and  her  pro- 
tection for  Lafayette,  who  was  the  promoter  of  the  alliance. 
When,  at  the  beginning  of  February,  1779,  the  young  general 
returned  to  France,  Louis  XVI.,  in  order  to  punish  him  for  his 
disobedience,  commanded  him  to  remain  a  week  at  Paris,  in  the 
house  of  his  father-in-law,  without  going  anywhere.  But  as  soon 
as  this  arrest  was  over,  Lafayette  reappeared  at  Versailles,  where 


HER   INTEREST    IN    THE   WAR.  255 

he  was  the  object  of  an  enthusiastic  ovation ;  the  king  himself 
only  addressed  an  affectionate  reprimand  to  him ;  the  queen 
received  him  with  eager  curiosity:  "  Give  me  news  of  our  good 
Americans,  of  our  dear  republicans."  On  his  request,  she  sent 
a  full-length  portrait  of  herself  to  Washington.  She  copied  with 
her  own  hand  some  lines  from  the  play  of  Gaston  and  Bayard, 
wherein  the  public  saw  an  allusion  to  the  hero  of  the  two  worlds. 

"...  Ah,  what  youth  is  this 
In  whom  we  perceive  the  wisdom  of  age  ? 

I  love  to  tread  in  his  footsteps,  copy  his  mien. 

His  prudence  I  honour,  rejoice  in  his  courage  : 

Grant  a  warrior  these  twain,  and  what  matters  his  age  ?  " 

She  used  all  her  power  to  have  him  given  a  high  command  in 
the  army  corps  which  was  to  be  sent  to  the  aid  of  the  United 
States.  She  assured  Rochambeau  of  her  good-will;  and  when 
the  Comte  d'Estaing,  the  happy  conqueror  of  the  "  Granada," 
was  presented  to  the  king,  on  his  return  from  the  brilliant  expe- 
dition which  had  excited  in  France  such  extraordinary  enthu- 
siasm, she  condescended  herself  to  bring  him  a  footstool  whereon 
he  could  rest  his  wounded  leg,  —  a  gracious  attention,  for  which 
she  was  to  be  so  sadly  repaid. 

The  solicitude  of  the  queen  was  incessantly  on  the  alert  con- 
cerning affairs  in  America,  concerning  the  chances  of  the  war, 
above  all,  the  operations  of  the  navy;  and  her  heart,  which  has 
been  accused  of  beating  only  in  the  interests  of  Austria,  beat 
with  incomparable  force  for  all  that  touched  the  honour  or  glory 
of  France. 

When,  in  the  month  of  March,  1780,  they  were  preparing  to 
send  under  the  command  of  Rochambeau  a  body  of  troops  to 
America,  Marie  Antoinette  was  all  uneasiness.  "  We  cannot," 
she  said,  "risk  this  large  convoy  without  being  sure  of  the  sea; 
it  would  be  frightful  to  suffer  any  misfortune  from  that.  I  avow 
I  cannot  think  of  it  calmly."  "  The  troops  destined  for  the 
Islands  have  embarked,  and  are  only  awaiting  a  favourable  wind 
to  leave  port,"  she  wrote,  a  month  later.  "  God  grant  that  they 
may  arrive  in  safety !  "  Her  thought  followed  those  vessels, 
which  were  carrying  the  soldiers  and  fortunes  of  France  across 
the  sea ;  and  as  if  to  crown  these  patriotic  anxieties,  it  was  in  the 
apartment  of  the  queen,  on  Nov.  19,  1781,  a  few  days  after  the 
birth  of  the  dauphin,  that  the  king  learned  from  the  mouth 


256  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

of  the  Due  de  Luzerne  the  great  and  good  news  of  the  capitu- 
lation of  Cornwallis,  forced  to  surrender  by  the  fleet  of  the 
Comte  de  Grasse,  and  the  united  troops  of  Washington  and 
Rochambeau. 

Public  opinion  tired  sooner  than  the  queen  of  these  efforts  of 
France,  and  of  the  uncertainties  of  the  war.  From  the  beginning 
of  1779,  it  was  disposed  toward  peace;  this  inclination  was  much 
more  decided  after  the  failure  of  the  project  of  a  descent  upon 
England.  Austria  and  Russia  proposed  their  mediation.  "  It 
would  be  a  great  good  fortune,"  Marie  Antoinette  replied,  "  and 
my  heart  desires  it  more  than  anything  in  the  world.  But," 
she  added  proudly,  "  the  failure  of  this  campaign  precludes  all 
idea  of  a  peace."  In  the  council,  Necker,  who  was  ill  disposed 
toward  America,  and  concerned  for  the  financial  situation,  in- 
sisted upon  a  prompt  cessation  of  hostilities ;  Maurepas,  \vlio 
was  always  weary  of  anything  which  necessitated  contention  and 
caused  embarrassment,  —  Maurepas  made  overtures  to  a  former 
secretary  of  the  English  embassy  to  Paris.  The  king  himself 
was  tired  of  the  war,  and  wished  that  it  should  be  finished  before 
the  end  of  the  year.  Spain  on  her  part  sought  to  make  a  sepa- 
rate arrangement:  the  Americans  fought  but  feebly,  since  Eng- 
land had  offered  to  recognize  their  independence,  and  at  bottom 
the  two  allied  nations  did  not  love  each  other.  "  Our  allies," 
the  Count  von  Fersen  wrote,  "  have  not  always  acted  well  toward 
us,  and  the  time  we  have  passed  with  them  has  taught  us  neither 
to  love  nor  esteem  them."  Austria  renewed  her  offers  of  media- 
tion. The  queen  desired  an  agreement  no  less  than  the  king 
and  his  ministers;  but  she  desired  that  it  should  be  honourable, 
and  protested  energetically  against  any  humiliating  treaty: 
"  Peace  would  be  a  great  boon ;  but  if  our  enemies  do  not  de- 
mand it,  I  should  be  greatly  afflicted  if  we  made  one  that  was 
humiliating." 

This  peace,  the  object  of  so  many  prayers,  finally  came  in 
1783;  it  filled  Marie  Antoinette  with  joy  ;  she  never  spoke  of  it  but 
with  pride  and  the  sentiment  of  a  queen,  and  of  a  French  queen; 
for  it  was  such  an  one  as  she  had  wished,  —  an  honourable  one.  It 
acknowledged  forever  the  independence  of  the  allies  for  whom 
we  had  carried  on  this  distant  war.  France,  always  generous, 
one  might  say  too  generous,  demanded  nothing  for  herself,  and 
only  gained  from  these  campaigns  an  incontestable  renown, 
trifling  gratitude,  and  a  heavy  debt. 


PRINCELY    VISITORS.  257 

Marie  Antoinette,  happy  in  the  prestige  which  redounded  to 
the  glory  of  the  realm  and  her  husband's  reign,  did  not  cease  to 
manifest  her  satisfaction  to  all  those  whose  bravery  had  con- 
tributed to  this  success.  When,  on  Jan.  21,  1782,  Lafayette  re- 
turned unexpectedly  to  France,  the  queen,  who  was  present  at 
an  entertainment  at  the  Hotel  de  Ville  in  honour  of  her  recent 
confinement,  wished  to  drive  Madame  Lafayette  to  the  Hotel  de 
Xoailles,  where  her  husband  had  just  arrived,  in  her  own  carriage ; 
and  when  Suffren,  the  conqueror,  appeared  at  Versailles,  "  My 
son,"  she  said  to  the  young  dauphin,  "  learn  early  to  hear  pro- 
nounced, and  to  pronounce  yourself,  the  names  of  the  heroic  de- 
fenders of  your  country.  You  have  read  the  lives  of  great  men 
in  Plutarch,  here  is  one ;  you  must  learn  his  name  and  never 
forget  it."  Captivated,  like  the  nation,  with  the  chivalrous  and 
brilliant  aspect  of  the  war,  the  generous  sovereign  had  not 
thought  of  the  deficit  which  the  enormous  expenditures  necessi- 
tated by  so  many  armaments  would  make  in  our  finances,  nor 
of  the  germs  of  vague  discontent  and  of  restless  independence 
which  the  contagion  of  example,  the  sight  of  institutions  half 
understood,  the  attraction  of  novelty,  the  formation  of  an  Ameri- 
can school  in  place  of  an  English  school,  was  to  implant  in  all 
minds.  She  thought  that  she  had  sustained  a  revolt;  she  had 
prepared  a  revolution. 

The  disquietudes  of  the  war  and  of  politics  did  not  put  an  end 
to  princely  visits.  France  was  always  the  centre  of  polite  society. 
The  court  at  Versailles  set  the  fashion  for  all  Europe;  people 
thronged  there  from  all  sides.  There  came  in  1780  the  Princess 
of  Hesse-Darmstadt,  and  the  two  young  princesses,  Louise  and 
Charlotte,  who  had  been  brought  up  with  Marie  Antoinette  at 
Vienna.  The  queen  was  delighted  to  see  these  friends  of  her 
childhood,  whom  she  had  not  seen  for  ten  years,  and  whom  she 
loved  dearly.  She  showed  them  the  delights  of  Trianon,  took 
them  to  a  ball  at  the  opera,  gave  them  a  place  in  her  box  at  the 
play,  took  them  for  a  drive  in  the  woods  of  Marly  and  of  St. 
Germain,  accompanied  them  herself  to  shops,  and  with  the  affec- 
tionate experience  of  a  woman  of  heart  and  a  woman  of  taste, 
who  feared  that  these  Germans,  but  newly  arrived  in  France, 
might  be  guilty  of  some  eccentricities  of  toilet,  recommended 
them  not  to  make  themselves  too  fine  when  coming  to  Trianon 
or  to  her  box,  and  not  to  wear  large  hats  when  driving,  and  to 
wear  at  the  balls  given  by  the  Comtesse  Diane  de  Polignac, 

VOL.  I.  — 17 


258  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

where  she  herself  had  had  them  invited,  only  simple  dresses  or 
polonaises.  She  received  them  at  her  table,  gave  them  her 
portrait,  overwhelmed  them  with  presents,  exhausted  for  them 
every  refinement  of  friendship,  and  when  the  princesses  left 
France,  they  carried  with  them,  beside  the  ineffaceable  remem- 
brance of  a  most  agreeable  reception,  the  promise  of  a  corre- 
spondence, which  was  faithfully  kept  even  in  the  days  of  anguish 
and  mourning  Marie  Antoinette  had  not  the  same  affectionate 
interest,  but  a  more  political  one  in  the  visits  of  the  Comte  and 
Comtesse  du  Nord.  At  first  sight  the  grand-duchess,  who  had 
a  beautiful  figure,  though  somewhat  too  fat  for  her  age,  and  who 
was  stiff  in  her  bearing,  and  fond  of  displaying  her  learning,  had 
displeased  her.  By  an  unusual  accident,  the  queen,  whose 
manners  were  easy,  and  who  had  always  an  amiable  word  to 
say,  had  been  embarrassed  before  these  imperial  visitors ;  she 
had  retired  to  her  chamber  as  though  overcome  with  faintness, 
and  had  said,  on  asking  for  a  glass  of  water,  that  she  had  just 
discovered  that  the  role  of  queen  was  more  difficult  to  play  in 
the  presence  of  other  sovereigns,  or  of  princes  destined  to  be- 
come sovereigns,  than  before  courtiers.  This  embarrassment, 
however,  was  but  momentary;  and  her  reception  of  her  new 
guests  was,  on  the  whole,  as  affable  and  gracious  as  usual. 

Joseph  II.  had  made  travelling  incognito  the  fashion.  The 
Grand-duke  Paul  of  Russia,  son  of  Catherine  II.,  travelled  with 
his  wife,  a  princess  of  Wurtemberg,  under  the  name  of  the 
Comte  and  Comtesse  du  Nord.  The  prince  had  laid  aside  all 
his  orders;  the  body-guard  did  not  salute  him;  and  the  two 
wings  of  the  door  were  not  opened  before  him  in  the  king's 
apartment.  However,  he  had  consented  to  lodge  at  the  chateau, 
where  the  apartment  of  the  Prince  de  Conde  had  been  arranged 
for  his  reception.  The  travellers  arrived  in  Paris  on  May  18,  and 
went  to  Versailles  on  the  2Oth.  The  first  interview  was  cold  ;  the 
queen,  as  we  have  said,  was  disturbed  ;  the  king  appeared  timid, 
as  usual.  That  evening,  at  dinner,  all  embarrassment  disap- 
peared. The  grand-duchess  exhibited  wit;  the  grand-duke,  who 
was  extremely  ugly,  and  had  a  face  like  a  Tartar,  made  up  for 
his  ugliness  by  the  vivacity  of  his  eyes  and  conversation.  The 
queen,  "  beautiful  as  the  day,"  animated  all  by  her  presence. 

The  ice  was  broken.  Three  days  later,  the  Comte  and 
Comtesse  du  Nord  were  present  at  a  play  at  Versailles  in  the 
royal  box.  The  queen,  anxious  to  please  her  guests,  profited  by 


BALL   AT   VERSAILLES.  259 

this  occasion  to  offer  to  the  countess  a  magnificent  fan,  orna- 
mented with  diamonds,  and  containing  a  lorgnette.  "  I  know," 
she  said  graciously,  "  that  you,  like  me,  are  somewhat  near- 
sighted; permit  me  to  remedy  that  defect,  and  keep  this  simple 
ornament  in  memory  of  me."  "  I  shall  keep  it  all  my  life,"  the 
princess  replied ;  "  for  I  shall  owe  to  it  the  pleasure  of  being 
better  able  to  see  your  Majesty." 

Marie  Antoinette  could  not  fail  to  do  the  honours  of  Trianon 
for  her  guests.  There  was  given  in  the  theatre  "  Zemire  et  Azor  " 
by  Gretry,  and  "Jean  Fracasse  au  Serail,"  a  ballet  by  Gerdet; 
the  dances  were  gay,  the  costumes  very  rich,  the  actors  excellent. 
After  the  play  there  was  supper;  after  the  supper  an  illumina- 
tion. The  garden  looked  like  fairy-land ;  the  queen  enjoyed  all 
these  splendours,  which  were  hers,  and  her  grace  and  kindness 
and  delicate  thoughtfulness  added  to  them.  "  How  much  I 
should  like  to  live  with  her !  "  the  Comtesse  du  Nord  said,  on  the 
day  following  this  entertainment.  "  How  glad  I  should  be  if 
Monsieur  le  Comte  du  Nord  were  dauphin  of  France !  " 

Then  on  Saturday,  June  8,  there  was  a  fancy-dress  ball  at 
Versailles.  The  salons,  and  especially  the  gallery,  were  beauti- 
fully decorated  with  a  profusion  of  candles  and  girandoles.  The 
whole  court  was  in  full  dress,  the  king  having  ordered  that  every 
one  should  be  as  brilliant  as  possible,  or  not  appear.  The  ladies 
who  danced  wore  dominoes  of  white  satin,  with  little  paniers  and 
little  qiieues.  But  the  queen  outshone  every  one.  "  She  had 
a  manner  of  walking,"  an  eye-witness  said,  "  a  graceful  majesty 
in  the  carriage  of  her  head,  which  was  peculiar  to  her."  The 
crowd,  eager  to  see,  pressed  about  her  with  such  indiscretion 
that  for  a  moment  the  king,  feeling  himself  pushed,  complained; 
the  grand-duke,  who  was  near  him,  retreated  for  an  instant. 
"  Sire,"  he  said,  "pardon  me;  I  have  become  so  like  the  French 
that  I,  like  them,  thought  that  I  could  not  approach  your  Majesty 
too  closely." 

An  early  friend  of  the  grand-duchess,  who  accompanied  her 
on  this  voyage,  —  the  Baroness  von  Oberkirche,  —  relates  that 
during  this  festival  she  found  herself  for  a  moment  behind  Marie 
Antoinette. 

'•  •  Madame  von  Oberkirche,'  the  queen  said  to  me.  'speak  a  little  Ger- 
man to  me,  to  see  if  I  remember  it.  I  only  know  the  language  of  my  new 
country.'  I  spoke  a  few  words  in  German.  She  remained  thoughtful  for 
a  few  seconds  without  replying.  '  Ah,'  she  said  finally,  'I'm  none  the 


2&0  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE 

less  happy  to  hear  the  old  German  ;  you  speak  like  a  Saxon,  without  any 
Alsatian  accent,  which  astonishes  me.  German  is  a  beautiful  language  ; 
but  it  seems  to  me  that  French,  in  the  mouth  of  my  children,  is  the 
sweetest  in  the  world.'  " 

After  this  ball,  which  ended  early,  there  was  a  supper  at  the 
house  of  the  Princesse  de  Lamballe.  The  queen  was  there. 
The  number  was  small,  but  very  select.  They  played  loto, 
then  danced.  This  little  improvised  ball  was  much  gayer  than 
the  other.  The  king,  according  to  his  custom,  only  just  ap- 
peared. After  his  departure,  respect  no  longer  interfered  with 
pleasure,  and  all  were  very  well  content  with  a  sort  of  intimacy 
which  was  not  disagreeable  to  the  queen.  In  imitation  of  the 
sovereign,  the  royal  family  gave  splendid  entertainments  to  the 
august  visitors.  More  tactful  and  thoughtful  than  the  Archduke 
Maximilian,  the  Comte  and  Comtesse  du  Nord  had  taken  care 
to  send,  on  the  day  following  their  arrival,  their  cards  to  the 
princes  and  princesses  of  the  blood.  Flattered  by  this  attention 
from  the  future  emperor  of  all  the  Russias,  they  vied  with  one 
another  in  prodigalities  for  their  reception.  The  Due  d'Orleans 
gave  them  a  dinner  at  Raincy ;  the  Comte  d'Artois  offered  them 
a  magnificent  concert  and  a  gay  collation  at  Bagatelle.  At 
Sceaux,  the  excellent  and  venerable  Due  de  Penthievre  gave 
them  an  exquisite  breakfast,  followed  by  a  drive  through  the 
park,  of  which  the  prince  was  eager  himself  to  do  the  honours. 

But  of  all  these  entertainments,  none  could  claim  the  brilliancy 
of  those  at  Chantilly.  The  hospitality  of  the  Condes  was  pro- 
verbial, and  the  reception  of  June  10,  1782,  did  not  belie  their 
reputation.  There  was  a  general  illumination  of  the  chateau  and 
park,  a  hunt,  a  concert  in  the  mysterious  pavilion,  where,  seated 
upon  soft  sofas,  one  listened  to  invisible  musicians.  One  might 
have  fancied  one  was  listening  to  the  angels  in  heaven.  After- 
ward a  ball  in  the  open-air  ball-room;  a  supper  on  the  Island 
of  Love,  or  in  the  hamlet,  for  Madame  de  Conde  had  her  hamlet 
at  Chantilly,  as  the  queen  had  hers  at  Trianon;  and  finally 
another  hunt  by  torchlight.  The  hunt  was  also  one  of  the  tra- 
ditional amusements  of  the  Condes.  When  they  finally  sepa- 
rated, the  prince  said  to  the  grand-duke,  "  We  shall  be  very  far 
from  each  other,  but  if  your  Highness  permits  it,  and  the  king 
does  not  object,  I  may  go  some  day  to  St.  Petersburg,  to  re- 
turn the  visit  which  you  have  done  me  the  honour  to  make 
me." 


VISIT   OF   THE    KING    OF    SWEDEN.  261 

"We  shall  receive  you  with  enthusiasm,  Monsieur;  and  the 
empress  will  b^  very  happy  to  see  you  in  our  savage  country." 

"  Alas !  it  is  only  a  dream,"  replied  the  Comte  de  Conde,  with 
a  sigh. 

How  could  he  imagine  that  this  journey  to  Russia,  which  he 
now  looked  upon  as  a  dream,  he  should  make  fifteen  years  later 
as  a  proscribed  person,  while  that  beautiful  Chantilly,  whose 
honours  he  did  with  such  noble  prodigality,  would  be  only  a  ruin 
open  to  the  winds  of  heaven? 

At  that  moment  he  heard  only  murmurs  which  flattered  his 
ears ;  the  fame  of  the  magnificence  of  Chantilly  had  spread  over 
all  Europe,  and  this  saying  was  circulated  to  the  honour  of  the 
Condes :  "  The  king  received  Monsieur  le  Comte  du  Nord  like  a 
friend;  Monsieur  le  Comte  d'Orl^ans  received  him  like  a  bour- 
geois, and  Monsieur  le  Prince  de  Conde,  like  a  sovereign." 

\Yith  the  public  the  success  of  the  Comte  and  Comtesse  du 
Nord  was  not  less  great  than  at  court.  Paris  was  infatuated  with 
the  future  czar  and  czarina  of  all  the  Russias,  as  it  had  been  in- 
fatuated with  the  emperor  of  Germany.  Philosophers  and  men 
of  letters  offered  them  incense.  La  Harpe  read  them  his  trans- 
lation of  Lucian ;  Beaumarchais,  his  "  Mariage  de  Figaro ;  "  at 
the  Academic  des  Sciences,  Condorcet  addressed  them ;  at  the 
Theatre  Francois,  verses  were  recited  in  their  honour.  Before 
their  departure  the  king  gave  them  some  splendid  tapestries 
from  Gobelin ;  the  queen  had  a  magnificent  toilet  set  of  Sevres 
porcelain,  blue  lapis,  decorated  with  painting  and  enamel,  and 
mounted  in  gold,  presented  to  them  in  a  most  delicate  manner. 
"  Moil  Dien,  how  beautiful  it  is !  "  the  grand-duchess  said  on  see- 
ing it;  "it  is  without  doubt  for  the  queen."  "  Madame,"  the 
superintendent,  the  Comte  d'Angivilliers,  replied,  "  the  queen 
offers  it  to  Madame  la  Comtesse  du  Nord ;  she  hopes  that  it  will 
be  agreeable  to  her,  and  that  she  will  keep  it  in  memory  of  her 
Majesty."  And  on  looking  at  it  a  little  more  closely,  the  prin- 
cess saw  that  it  bore  her  arms. 

On  June  19,  the  Comte  and  Comtesse  du  Nord  quitted  Paris, 
and  after  having  breakfasted  at  Choisy,  set  out  to  travel  through 
France  on  their  way  back  to  Russia. 

Two  years  later  the  king  of  Sweden  came  in  his  turn.  But  of 
what  use  to  describe  all  these  princely  visits?  There  are  always 
the  same  details,  above  all,  the  same  love  of  incognito.  The 
king  of  Sweden,  under  the  name  of  the  Comte  de  Haga,  arrived 


262  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

so  unexpectedly  on  June  9,  1784,  that  Louis  XVI.,  warned  in 
haste  at  Rambouillet,  returned  precipitately  to  Versailles,  and 
the  key  of  his  apartment  having  been  lost,  could  only  appear 
before  his  guest  in  the  most  extraordinary  costume,  wearing  one 
shoe  with  a  red  heel,  and  another  with  a  black,  a  gold  buckle 
and  a  silver  buckle.  With  the  exception  of  this  unusual  inci- 
dent, it  would  seem  that  there  was  the  same  invariable  pro- 
gramme for  all  these  august  visitors,  to  which  they  all  scrupu- 
lously conformed,  — a  supper  at  Versailles,  a  performance  at  the 
opera,  at  the  Theatre  Fran£ais,  at  the  Comedie  Italienne,  accom- 
panied by  the  plaudits  of  the  public,  an  audience  of  Parliament, 
a  session  at  the  Academic,  a  visit  to  personages  of  renown  and 
places  of  amusement,  and  to  crown  all,  an  entertainment  at 
Trianon. 

It  was  Marie  Antoinette's  coquetry,  since  she  no  longer 
danced,  being  too  old,  herself  to  do  the  honours  of  her  chateau 
to  the  crowned  heads ;  she  displayed  no  longer  the  official 
politeness  of  the  sovereign,  but  the  charming  cordiality  of  a 
woman  of  the  world;  she  was  no  longer  queen,  but  mistress 
of  her  house.  On  that  day  there  was  a  play  in  the  theatre ; 
they  gave  the  "  Dormeur  Eveille,"  by  Marmontel  and  Gretry, 
with  magnificent  scenery  and  ballet ;  then  a  supper  under  the 
trees,  and  an  illumination  of  the  English  gardens.  Numerous 
guests  filled  the  park;  all  the  ladies  were  in  white.  "It  was 
like  fairy-land,"  Gustavus  III.  himself  wrote,  "  a  scene  worthy  of 
the  Elysian  fields."  At  supper  the  queen  did  not  wish  to  take 
her  place  at  table ;  she  was  entirely  occupied  with  doing  the 
honours.  With  that  exquisite  tact  and  bewitching  grace  which 
were  among  her  charms,  she  conversed  from  preference  with  the 
Swedes,  and  affected  to  receive  them  with  great  cordiality. 
Madame  Campan  asserts  that  Marie  Antoinette  was  prejudiced 
against  Gustavus  III.,  and  received  him  coldly.  All  that  we  know 
of  this  journey  and  the  relations  between  the  two  sovereigns 
seems  to  contradict  the  assertion  of  Madame  Campan  ;  and  if  the 
little  scene  which  she  describes,  wherein  the  queen  gave  a  lesson 
to  the  Comte  de  Haga,  really  took  place  in  the  way  she  describes, 
it  was  but  a  momentary  ebullition  of  anger  which  was  quickly 
forgotten.  T,he  correspondence  of  Marie  Antoinette  and  the 
king  of  Sweden  bears  the  impress  of  the  greatest  cordiality. 

In  the  preceding  year,  when  the  young  woman  had  had  a 
miscarriage,  Gustavus  had  exhibited  the  most  touching  sympathy 


BALLOON   ASCENSIONS.  263 

for  her,  "  like  a  good  gentleman,  who  was  sincerely  touched  by 
any  misfortune  that  could  happen  to  his  friend."  And  it  would 
seem  that  the  queen  was  not  less  attached  to  the  king  of  Sweden 
than  the  king  of  Sweden  to  the  queen.  The  prince  having 
expressed  the  desire  that  the  nephew  of  Cardinal  Bernis,  in 
whom  he  was  interested,  should  be  made  coadjutor  of  Alby,  it 
was  Marie  Antoinette  who  undertook  to  overcome  the  obstacles 
in  the  way  of  the  realization  of  this  wish ;  and  having  obtained 
the  favour,  it  was  she  who  hastened  to  announce  it  to  her  royal 
correspondent.  Was  not  Gustavus  III.  right  when  he  wrote  a  few 
years  before  to  the  Comte  de  Stedingk,  "  It  is  natural  to  be 
attached  to  the  queen"? 

The  novelty  then  in  fashion  was  a  balloon.  "  One  lost  on 
them,"  a  chronicler  has  wittily  said,  "  not  only  meat  and  drink, 
but  even  loto."  On  the  5th  of  June,  1783,  Montgolfier  had  made 
the  first  experiment  at  Annonay ;  he  had  repeated  it  on  Septem- 
ber 19  of  the  same  year,  on  the  Place  d'Armes  at  Versailles,  before 
the  king  and  queen,  in  the  midst  of  an  immense  crowd.  They 
desired  that  the  Comte  de  Haga  should  witness  this  diversion  ; 
and  on  June  23,  1784,  Pilatre  des  Rosiers,  who  was  to  perish  so 
miserably  the  following  year,  and  Proust,  a  professor  of  chemistry, 
set  out  from  the  court  of  the  ministers  in  the  count's  presence, 
rising  to  a  great  distance  to  descend,  three  quarters  of  an  hour 
liter,  in  the  forest  of  Chantilly.  The  balloon,  ornamented  with 
the  initials  of  the  two  kings,  and  with  a  white  armlet  in  honour 
of  the  king  of  Sweden,  bore  the  name  which  then  was  still  dear 
to  France  :  it  was  called  "  The  Marie  Antoinette." 

Finally  in  that  same  year,  1784,  in  the  month  of  August, 
Prince  Henry,  brother  of  Frederick  II.,  made  a  journey  to 
France,  more  from  policy,  perhaps,  than  for  pleasure ;  but  the 
queen  had  little  love  for  anything  Prussian,  and,  despite  the  admi- 
ration of  the  enthusiastic  Prussians,  who  much  preferred  this  new 
visitor  to  the  one  who  had  been  there  in  June,  she  saw  the  prince 
only  two  or  three  times,  and  so  briefly  that  she  had  but  a  vague 
idea  of  him. 

"  I  have  not  yet  had  many  opportunities  of  seeing  Prince  Henry,"  she 
wrote  to  the  king  of  Sweden  on  Oct.  21,  "because  since  his  arrival  here 
I  have  passed  most  of  my  time  at  Trianon,  where  I  have  received  only 
the  persons  I  know  best,  and  always  but  a  few  at  a  time.  .  .  .  Moreover, 
Monsieur  le  Comte  de  Haga  may  rest  assured  that  the  compliments 
and  civilities  of  Prince  Henry  cannot  make  me  forget  him,  or  the  time 
he  spent  here." 


264  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

And  she  added,  in  speaking  of  her  sojourn  at  Trianon,  "  This 
kind  of  life  is  best  suited  to  my  health,  and  to  the  beginning  of 
my  pregnancy,  which  progresses  happily."  The  queen  was 
pregnant  for  the  fourth  time.  In  the  preceding  autumn,  she  had 
had  an  accident  at  Fontainebleau  which  had  greatly  distressed 
her;  but  happily  her  health  had  not  been  injured,  and  at  the 
end  of  the  year,  Louis  XVI.  announced  joyously  to  his  brother- 
in-law,  Joseph  II.,  that  he  was  expecting  a  second  son. 

This  second  son  was  born  on  March  27,  1785,  on  Easter. 
This  time,  although  she  had  suffered  during  her  pregnancy,  and 
particularly  during  the  last  of  it,  and  had  had  fears  which  had 
determined  her  to  order  her  conscience  and  to  redouble  her 
devotion,  no  such  accidents  occurred  as  had  marked  the  birth 
of  Madame  Royale ;  her  deliverance  was  fortunate,  and  so 
prompt  that  at  Paris  one  heard  of  her  travail  and  of  the  birth 
at  the  same  time.  The  child,  like  its  brother  and  sister,  was 
baptized  on  the  same  day  in  the  chapel  of  the  chateau,  under 
the  name  of  Louis  Charles,  Due  de  Normandie.  He  had  for 
godfather,  Monsieur  le  Comte  de  Provence,  and  for  godmother, 
the  queen  of  the  two  Sicilys,  Marie  Caroline  of  Lorraine,  repre- 
sented by  Madame  Elisabeth. 

On  the  following  day,  Paris  celebrated  this  great  event  with 
public  rejoicings;  distributions  of  provisions  were  made  among 
the  people ;  fifteen  fountains  poured  forth  wine  in  profusion ;  a 
bonfire  was  lighted  on  the  Place  de  Greve,  and  in  the  evening 
the  entire  city  was  illuminated.  What  was  better  worth  while, 
all  the  debtors  for  nurses  retained  in  La  Force  were  set  free. 
On  the  1st  of  April,  a  solemn  Te  Deum  was  sung  in  Notre  Dame. 
On  May  24,  the  queen  came  in  her  turn  to  the  old  cathedral  to 
render  thanks  unto  God  for  her  third  child. 

The  ceremony  was  brilliant,  as  usual.  In  the  morning  the 
corps  de  ville,  in  their  velvet  robes,  assembled  at  the  Hotel  de 
Ville,  and  afterward  went  to  fetch  the  Due  de  Brissac,  governor 
of  Paris;  then  with  the  escort  of  the  Guards  of  Paris  and  the 
Swiss  Guards,  they  betook  themselves  in  their  gala  coaches  to 
the  Gate  of  the  Conference,  to  await  the  queen.  The  French 
Guards  and  the  Swiss  Guards  formed  the  line.  At  nine  o'clock 
the  cannon  from  the  Invalides  announced  the  arrival  of  the  royal 
cortege.  The  corps  dc  -cille  advanced  to  meet  it,  knelt  down,  and 
the  provost  of  merchants,  after  being  presented  by  the  governor, 
addressed  his  congratulations  to  Marie  Antoinette.  The  latter 


BANKRUPTCY   OF   THE    PRINCE    DE   GUEMENEE.      265 

replied  with  her  habitual  grace ;  then  the  door  of  the  carriage 
was  closed,  and  the  cortege  continued  its  way  to  the  cathedral. 
The  queen  there  performed  her  devotions ;  she  afterward  knelt 
at  Ste.  Genevieve,  and  joined  in  the  prayers  for  the  end  of  the 
frightful  drought  which  was  then  desolating  France.  Later  she 
went  to  dine  at  the  Tuileries.  Then  she  went  to  the  opera  with 
her  sister-in-law,  Madame  Elisabeth,  then  to  the  Temple  to  sup 
with  the  Comte  d'Artois.  After  supper  she  entered  her  carriage, 
and  following  the  boulevard,  was  driven  to  the  Place  Louis  XV., 
to  see  the  fireworks  and  the  illumination  of  the  colonnade. 

On  the  following  day,  Marie  Antoinette  dined  with  her  friend 
the  Princesse  de  Lamballe,  and  afterward  went  to  the  Comedie 
Italienne,  then  returned  to  Versailles.  The  acclamations,  which 
were  rare  in  the  city,  had  been  warmer  at  the  opera,  and  the 
queen  had  replied  to  them,  a  chronicler  has  said,  "  by  more  fre- 
quent and  gracious  reverences  than  usual." 

The  young  prince  had  received,  on  the  very  day  of  his  birth, 
the  ribbon  of  the  St.  Esprit;  then  he  had  been  placed,  with  his 
brother  and  sister,  in  the  hands  of  the  governess  of  the  Children 
of  France.  This  was  no  longer,  as  at  the  previous  confinements 
of  the  queen,  the  Princesse  de  Guemenee;  a  frightful  catas- 
trophe had  forced  her  to  quit  Versailles.  In  the  month  of  Sep- 
tember, 1782,  after  having  been  previously  announced  two  or 
three  times,  the  bankruptcy  of  the  Prince  de  Guemenee  had 
been  declared.  "  It  was  the  bankruptcy  of  a  sovereign,"  some 
one  said,  in  allusion  to  the  pretensions  of  the  De  Rohans  to 
be  treated  as  a  royal  house.  The  deficit  was  not  less  than 
twenty-eight  millions.  There  was  in  all  Paris  and  in  all  France 
a  general  hue  and  cry.  All  classes  of  society  suffered:  besides 
the  nobles,  such  as  the  Due  de  Lauzun  and  the  Comte  de  Coislin, 
and  men  of  letters,  such  as  Thomas,  and  the  Abbe  de  Lille, 
there  were  found  among  the  creditors  —  and  these  were  the  ones 
who  suffered  most —  servants,  small  merchants,  porters,  the  Bre- 
ton sailors,  who  had  carried  their  savings  to  the  descendant  of 
the  Due  de  Bretagne.  The  prince,  by  his  prodigalities,  the 
princess,  by  her  expenditures,  to  which  she  was  indeed  forced 
by  her  position,  had  squandered  everything.  The  Rohans  made 
unheard-of  efforts  to  hush  up  the  sad  affair;  Madame  de  Gueme- 
nee gave  up  her  diamonds ;  Madame  de  Marsan  sold  her  horses ; 
the  Duchesse  de  Montbazan  returned  her  jewels  to  the  jewellers 
who  had  furnished  them.  But  after  such  a  scandal  Madame  de 


266  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Guemenee  could  not  remain  at  court;  she  handed  in  her  resig- 
nation as  governess  to  the  Children  of  France. 

Who  should  replace  her?  Several  names  suggested  themselves 
to  the  queen.  But  the  Princesse  de  Chi  may  seemed  to  her  too 
austere ;  the  Duchesse  de  Duras  too  learned  and  too  witty. 

Public  rumour  hinted  at  the  Duchesse  de  Polignac  ;  but  did  she 
desire  it  ?  "  I  know  her,"  the  queen  said.  "  This  office  would  in 
no  way  conform  to  her  simple  and  quiet  tastes  and  to  a  sort  of 
indolence  of  character;  it  would  be  the  greatest  proof  of  devo- 
tion she  could  give  me  if  she  should  yield  to  my  desires." 
When  Monsieur  de  Besenval  went  to  speak  to  Marie  Antoi- 
nette of  the  rumour,  as  a  deputy  from  the  relatives  and  friends 
of  the  duchess,  who  were  always  eager  to  augment  an  influence 
which  they  found  to  their  advantage,  "Madame  de  Polignac?" 
she  replied.  "I  thought  you  knew  her  better;  she  does  not 
wish  for  the  place."  And,  in  fact,  Madame  de  Polignac,  who  was 
of  a  calm  and  somewhat  indolent  disposition,  recoiled  before 
a  title  whose  chain  was  heavy.  But  her  friends  desired  for  her 
the  prestige  which  this  office  would  give  her,  which  was  one  of 
the  most  important  of  the  perpetual  ones.  They  urged  her;  the 
queen  insisted;  and  the  favourite,  moved  by  the  desire  of  her 
royal  protectress,  and  accustomed,  thanks  to  her  very  indolence, 
to  yield  to  the  importunities  of  those  around  her,  ended  by  ac- 
cepting. She  was  nominated,  and  the  queen  was  happy.  At 
bottom,  what  Marie  Antoinette  desired  was  to  be,  under  cover  of 
her  friend,  the  governess  of  her  children  herself.  Thanks  to  this 
choice,  it  was  possible  for  her,  without  fear  of  trespassing  against 
etiquette,  or  hurting  any  one's  vanity,  to  direct  as  she  desired 
their  education,  and  to  forget  near  them  at  any  hour  of  the  day 
the  chagrin  which  was  beginning  to  assail  her,  and  the  responsi- 
bilities of  politics,  in  which  the  fatality  of  the  time  constrained 
her  to  mingle. 


CHAPTER   XIX. 

THE  QUEEN  ix  POLITICS;  HER  NATURAL  DISTASTE  FOR  AFFAIRS. — 
DISTRUST  OF  MAUREPAS.  —  LETTER  FROM  THE  QUEEN  TO  JOSEPH 
II.  —  APPOINTMENT  OF  MESSIEURS  DE  SEGUR  AND  DE  CASTRIES.  — THE 
QUEEN'S  SYMPATHY  FOR  NECKER  ;  SHE  SUPPORTS  HIM  IN  THE  PUB- 
LICATION OF  HIS  ACCOUNTS.  —  THE  FALL  OF  NECKER.  —  THE  DEATH 
OF  MAUREPAS.  —  JOLY  DE  FLEURY.  —  D'ORMESSON.  —  CALONNE. — 
THE  SMALL  PART  THAT  MARIE  ANTOINETTE  TOOK  IN  THE  NOMINA- 
TION OF  THE  LATTER  ;  HER  DISLIKE  OF  HIM.  —  AUSTRIAN  POLITICS. 
—  THE  ELECTION  OF  MAXIMILIAN  AT  COLOGNE.  —  THE  DISPUTE  OF 
JOSEPH  II.  WITH  HOLLAND. —  "THE  MARRIAGE  OF  FIGARO."  —  THE 
QUEEN  PLAYS  "  THE  BARBER  OF  SEVILLE  "  AT  TRIANON. 

THE  queen  had  never  cared  for  politics,  and  everything  had 
conspired  to  keep  her  aloof  from  them,  —  her  own  dislike, 
which  the  importunities  of  her  mother  and  the  counsels  of  Mercy 
had  not  always  succeeded  in  conquering;  her  education,  which  had 
only  been  directed  toward  accomplishments;  the  traditions  of  a 
court  where  since  Anne  of  Austria  no  wife  of  the  king  had  ever 
taken  part  in  affairs  ;  the  distrust  of  the  ministers,  who  feared  the 
irresistible  ascendancy  which  Marie  Antoinette  could  not  fail 
to  take  should  she  one  day  bring  to  bear  on  the  complications 
of  politics  the  whole  strength  of  a  mind  quick,  just,  firm,  and 
persuasive. 

"  The  more  I  have  the  honour  of  seeing  the  queen,"  the  Baron  de 
Stael  wrote,  "  the  more  am  I  strengthened  in  the  opinion  I  have  always 
held  of  the  excellence  of  her  character.  She  loves  truth,  and  one  can 
speak  it  to  her  if  she  be  persuaded  of  the  probity  and  disinterestedness  of 
him  who  speaks.  In  discoursing  with  nobility  and  frankness  one  is  sure  to 
please  her,  even  if  one  holds  an  opinion  contrary  to  her  own ;  as  soon  as 
she  discovers  falseness  or  flattery,  she  has  a  horror  of  them." 

It  was  this  very  excellence  of  character  which  the  ministers 
feared.  Vergennes  and  Maurepas,  above  all,  endeavoured  to 
keep  the  king  on  his  guard  against  all  interference  of  the  queen 
in  affairs.  The  old  minister,  urged  by  his  wife,  who  ruled  him 


268  LIFE   OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

completely,  and  who  as  aunt  of  the  Due  d'Aiguillon  bore  no 
love  to  Marie  Antoinette,  under  a  mask  of  respect  and  deference 
combated  with  obstinate  perseverance  and  the  experience  of  a 
diplomat  the  possible  influence  of  the  young  sovereign.  Madame 
Campan  even  accuses  him  of  having  sought  to  compromise  her. 
When  the  malice  of  courtiers  had  tried  to  use  her  promenades 
on  the  terrace  at  Versailles  against  Marie  Antoinette,  Maurepas 
"  had  had  the  cruel  policy  to  reply  to  the  k'ng  that  he  should 
allow  her  to  do  as  she  pleased  ;  that  she  had  intelligence ;  that 
her  friends  were  ambitious,  and  desirous  of  seeing  her  take  part  in 
affairs ;  and  that  it  was  best  to  allow  her  to  gz.in  a  reputation  for 
levity."  It  does  not  seem  probable  that  the  astute  old  man 
would  have  dared  to  use  any  such  language  to  his  master; 
Louis  XVI.  would  not  have  allowed  it.  But  that  he  was  in- 
wardly delighted  at  the  queen's  taste  for  frivolity;  that  he 
discreetly  insinuated  these  very  thoughts,  which  he  dared  not 
publicly  express;  that  he  encouraged  in  secret  the  young  woman 
to  give  herself  up  to  amusement,  and  the  king  not  to  talk  to  her 
of  affairs,  or  to  hide  them  from  her ;  that  he  had  even  redoubled 
his  efforts  after  the  first  pregnancy  of  the  queen  had  strengthened 
the  friendship  of  husband  and  wife,  to  prevent  the  "  sensibility  of 
his  master  from  having  any  influence  over  affairs  in  general,"  - 
does  not  appear  doubtful.  The  most  authentic  documents,  the 
secret  reports  of  the  ambassador  from  Austria  and  of  the  min- 
ister from  Prussia,  establish  it  irrefutably,  and  the  queen  her- 
self laboured  under  no  illusion  as  to  the  situation  in  which  she 
was  placed. 

"  He  — the  king  —  is  naturally  little  gallant,"  she  wrote  to  her  brother  ; 
"  and  it  often  happens  that  he  does  not  talk  to  me  of  important  affairs,  even 
when  he  has  no  desire  to  hide  them  from  me.  He  rep.ies  when  I  question 
him,  but  he  does  not  broach  them  ;  and  when  I  learn  the  quarter  of  an 
affair,  I  have  need  of  much  address  to  get  the  ministers  to  tell  me  the  rest 
of  it  by  allowing  them  to  believe  that  the  king  has  told  me  all.  When  I  re- 
proach the  king  for  not  having  spoken  to  me  of  certain  things,  he  does  not 
grow  angry,  but  has  a  somewhat  embarrassed  air,  and  sometimes  answers 
naturally  that  he  had  not  thought  of  it.  I  confess  to  you  that  political 
affairs  are  those'in  which  I  take  the  least  interest.  The  natural  mistrust  of 
the  king  was  originally  fortified  by  his  governor  ;  even  before  his  marriage 
Monsieur  de  la  Vauguyon  had  made  him  afraid  of  the  empire  which  his 
wife  might  gain  over  him,  and  his  dark  soul  had  amused  itself  by  frighten- 
ing his  pupil  with  all  the  phantoms  invented  against  the  House  of  Austria. 


MOXTBARREY    IS    MINISTER   OF   WAR.  269 

Monsieur  de  Maurepas,  although  possessed  of  less  character  and  malice, 
has  thought  it  advantageous  to  his  power  to  encourage  the  king  in  these 
ideas.  Monsieur  de  Vergennes  follows  the  same  course,  and  perhaps 
makes  use  of  his  correspondence  with  foreign  affairs  to  introduce  falsity 
and  lies.  I  have  spoken  to  the  king  frankly  on  this  subject  more  than 
once.  He  has  sometimes  answered  me  angrily,  and  as  he  is  incapable 
of  discussion,  I  have  not  been  able  to  convince  him  that  his  minister  was 
deceived,  or  deceived  him.  I  am  not  blind  with  regard  to  my  influence  ; 
I  know  that  as  far  as  politics  are  concerned,  1  have  little  ascendancy  over 
the  king." 

The  queen  was  repeatedly  advised  to  conciliate  Maurepas, 
either  to  win  him  over  by  favours,  or  to  intimidate  him  by  her 
ascendancy,  but  under  no  circumstances  to  arouse  his  antagonism 
by  affecting  to  get  on  without  him ;  to  make  of  him  an  ally  and 
not  an  adversary.  The  king  himself  urged  her  to  do  so.  She  had 
never  consented,  and  had  never  been  willing  to  win  the  minister 
either  by  force  or  kindness.  Was  this  owing  to  the  pressure  of 
those  about  her,  to  the  insinuations  of  Choiseul's  partisans,  as 
Von  Goltz  and  Mercy  believed?  Or  was  it  simply  natural  pride 
or  indifference  to  affairs?  Whatever  it  was,  during  the  first  years 
of  her  reign,  save  the  part  she  took  in  the  dismissal  of  Turgot  — 
a  part  to  be  regretted,  but  wherein  she  was  fully  in  accord  with 
public  opinion,  excited  against  the  reforms  of  the  minister  —  and 
her  interest  in  the  affair  of  Bavaria,  the  true  extent  of  which 
interest  we  have  shown,  she  had  always  held  aloof  from  politics. 
It  was  not  till  1780  that  she  seemed  disposed  to  concern  herself 
with  affairs,  and,  as  Mercy  says,  with  important  affairs ;  and  the*n 
her  intervention  was  limited  to  influencing  the  appointment  of 
a  minister,  the  minister  of  war. 

When  in  September,  1777,  the  Comte  de  Saint-Germain  fell 
before  the  storms  incited  by  his  innovations,  the  Prince  de  Mont- 
barrey,  assistant-director,  remained  alone  in  charge  of  the  depart- 
ment ;  but  his  talents  were  by  no  means  equal  to  the  heavy 
burden  which  he  had  assumed.  Brave  and  witty,  but  disliking 
work,  unable  to  resist  the  solicitations  of  women  or  the  importu- 
nities of  the  courtiers,  he  allowed  discipline  to  become  lax,  and 
disorder  to  creep  into  his  administration.  Maurepas  alone,  and 
his  wife,  a  relative  of  Madame  de  Montbarrey,  supported  him ; 
but  the  clamour  of  the  army  became  too  strong.  The  minister 
was  allowed  to  hand  in  his  resignation  and  was  obliged  to  retire ; 
and  public  opinion  approved  of  his  disgrace.  The  Polignac 


2/0  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

set  wished  to  have  the  Comte  d'Adhemar  appointed  in  his 
place;  the  queen  opposed  him,  and  despite  Maurepas,  \vho 
proposed  Monsieur  de  Puysegur,  or  his  nephew,  the  Due 
d'Aiguillon,  had  the  portfolio  of  war  given  to  Monsieur  de  Segur, 
lieutenant-general,  —  a  brave  officer,  who  had  acquitted  himself 
well  in  the  campaign  in  Flanders,  and  lost  an  arm  at  the  battle  of 
Laufeld.  On  the  day  he  was  presented,  the  queen  said  to  Ma- 
dame Campan,  "You  have  just  seen  a  minister  according  to  my 
way  of  thinking.  I  have  no  anxiety  for  the  king's  service :  the 
appointment  is  an  excellent  one ;  but  I  am  almost  sorry  for  the 
part  which  I  took  in  it.  I  have  assumed  a  responsibility;  I 
should  be  happy  not  to  have  any,  and  to  escape  from  it  always 
as  much  as  possible.  I  have  just  promised  Monsieur  de  Segur, 
and  that  on  my  word  of  honour,  not  to  recommend  any  appli- 
cant, and  in  no  wise  to  interfere  with  any  of  his  operations  by 
petitions  for  my  proteges." 

If  we  turn  to  the  Memoirs  of  the  Comte  de  Segur,  we  shall 
find  that  Marie  Antoinette  was  not  always  faithful  to  this  promise, 
and  that  one  day  her  demands  were  so  pressing  that  the  old 
officer,  growing  impatient,  wished  to  hand  in  his  resignation. 
The  queen  was  displeased ;  but  after  a  long  interview  with  the 
minister's  son,  she  understood  his  reasons.  "  Say  to  your  father," 
she  said  to  him,  "that  we  are  reconciled,  and  that  I  am  only 
angry  with  him  for  the  temper  he  showed  in  offering  his  resig- 
nation." With  this  exception,  Marie  Antoinette  had  no  cause 
to  repent  of  her  appointment.  Monsieur  de  Segur,  who  had 
been  made  marshal  in  1783,  was  very  superior  to  his  predeces- 
sor both  in  talent  and  in  character;  and  the  most  of  the  meas- 
ures which  he  undertook  did  honour  to  the  minister  and  his 
protectress. 

For  a  long  time  it  was  believed  that  the  queen  had  done  as 
much  for  the  navy  as  she  had  for  the  department  of  war,  and 
that  she  had  contributed  to  the  dismissal  of  Sartines,  and  to  the 
elevation  of  the  Marquis  de  Castries.  The  truth  is  that  this 
nomination,  which,  moreover,  was  no  surprise,  was  due  solely  to 
an  intrigue  of  Madame  de  Polignac,  of  the  Comte  de  Vaudreuil, 
and  of  the  comptroller-general,  who  was  a  friend  of  Monsieur  de 
Castries.  Marie  Antoinette  had  no  part  in  it;  she  had  always 
protected  Castries,  and  she  continued  to  do  so  to  the  end,  and 
aided  in  obtaining  for  him  an  excellent  pension. 

It  was    Maurepas,   who,    deceived    by  false    information,  and 


NECKER'S    FALL.  271 


believing  himself  to  be  doing  an  act  of  great  policy,  had  himself 
lent  a  hand  to  the  combination  proposed  by  Necker.  He 
avenged  himself  by  dismissing  Necker  in  his  turn,  by  means  of 
a  little  strategy,  analogous  to  the  one  of  which  he  had  been  the 
dupe.  „ 

The  queen  was  afflicted  at  this  disgrace.  Despite  the  lack  of 
savoir  vivre  of  the  Genevan,  who  on  his  presentation  had  famil- 
iarly taken  her  hand  and  kissed  it  without  her  permission,  she 
liked  Necker,  and  for  a  long  time  shared  the  popular  infatuation 
for  him.  It  was  she  in  great  part  who,  despite  Maurepas,  had 
induced  Louis  XVI.  to  authorize  the  publication  of  the  famous 
"  Account,"  which  was  the  first  appeal  to  the  intervention  of  pub- 
lic opinion  in  the  management  of  the  finances  and  the  administra- 
tion of  the  State.  But  the  old  minister  redoubled  his  attacks; 
his  cutting  pleasantries  on  the  subject  of  the  "  Account,"  which 
he  called  in  jest  the  Conte  bleu,  the  criticisms  incited  by  the  inno- 
vations of  the  comptroller-general,  which  many  considered  dan- 
gerous, his  pretensions,  often  indiscreet,  finished  in  a  short  time 
by  undermining  his  credit;  and  on  May  19,  1791,  he  handed  in 
his  resignation,  despite  the  queen's  efforts  to  prevent  his  fall, 
and  to  induce  him  to  remain.  The  clamour  at  this  fall  was  great : 
"  All  impartial  persons  are  grieved,"  a  lady  of  the  court  wrote. 
Public  opinion  at  Paris  and  in  the  country  became  alarmed ;  one 
saw  in  the  event  almost  the  ruin  of  the  credit  of  France.  The 
system  of  Necker,  who  supplemented  the  taxes  by  loans,  flat- 
tered a  light  and  frivolous  nation,  who  only  saw  the  momentary 
relief,  without  thinking  of  the  inevitable  burdens  entailed  in  the 
future,  and  who  did  not  calculate  that  the  loans,  whose  actual 
revenues  did  not  suffice  to  pay  the  interest  on  them,  would  lead 
fatally  and  with  brief  delay  to  crushing  taxes,  or  to  a  disastrous 
bankruptcy.  The  complaints  were  widespread  among  the  pub- 
lic ;  the  most  moderate,  even  those  who  blamed  certain  of 
Necker's  plans,  said  that  one  might  have  restrained  his  imagina- 
tion while  profiting  by  his  talent  for  finance.  As  for  the  queen, 
she  openly  avowed  her  regret ;  she  shut  herself  up  in  her  room 
for  an  entire  day  to  weep,  and  hastened  to  write  to  her  brother 
that  she  had  in  no  way  participated  in  this  change  of  ministers, 
and  that  she  was  very  sorry  for  it. 

Maurepas  did  not  long  enjoy  his  victory.  The  old  minister 
was  visibly  failing;  violent  attacks  of  a  disease  to  which  he  was 
subject — the  gout  —  tormented  him  incessantly.  In  the  month 


272  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

of  November,  1781,  the  disease  became  more  serious;  gangrene 
set  in,  and  all  hope  was  given  up.  When  the  Due  de  Lauzun 
brought  to  Paris  the  brilliant  news  of  the  capitulation  of  Corn- 
wallis,  and  some  one  went  to  announce  it  to  the  prime  minister, 
"  I  am  no  longer  of  this  world,"  he  replied.  He  none  the  less 
had  the  messenger  enter ;  but  the  interview  was  short ;  the  old 
man  was  dying.  On  the  i6th  tl^e  last  sacrament  was  admin- 
istered to  him;  on  the  2ist,  at  eleven  o'clock  of  the  evening,  he 
ceased  to  breathe. 

He  passed  away  in  an  hour  of  triumph,  —  a  triumph  too  fugi- 
tive, alas !  one  which  could  not  conceal  or  dissipate  the  perils 
of  the  future.  From  the  ministers  of  Louis  XV.  Maurepas  had 
inherited  a  France  exhausted,  discontented,  agitated  by  inward 
throes  which  preceded  and  presaged  a  revolution.  After  seven 
years  and  a  half  of  the  absolute  power  which  the  king  had 
allowed  him,  he  disappeared  from  the  scene,  leaving  the  situa- 
tion as  disturbed  as  in  the  beginning,  the  finances  as  exhausted, 
an  uncertain  policy,  and  an  authority  less  respected  than  ever. 
Attacked  at  each  instant  by  those  pamphlets  which  he  loved  so 
dearly,  and  those  songs  in  which  he  was  a  past  master;  a  thou- 
sand germs  of  revolt  having  been  excited  among  the  populace; 
the  public  having  been  irritated  by  deceptions,  and  the  more 
exacting  because  it  had  been  deceived,  —  the  incurable  frivolity 
of  the  old  minister  had  allowed  all  the  springs  to  become  re- 
laxed, the  resources  to  dissipate  themselves  in  pure  loss.  He 
left  the  ship  of  State — on  which,  according  to  the  saying  of  a 
contemporary,  he  had  been  a  passenger  rather  than  a  pilot  — 
destitute  of  a  rudder,  and  exposed  to  every  storm. 

Louis  XVI.  none  the  less  regretted  this  minister,  whom  he  was 
wont  to  consider  as  his  mentor,  and  for  whom  the  ties  of  habit 
had  become  those  of  friendship.  "  Ah,"  he  said,  with  tears  in 
his  eyes,  when  he  learned  of  Maurepas's  death,  "  I  shall  no 
longer  hear  my  old  friend  overhead  every  morning."  He  had 
shown  the  minister  every  attention  during  his  last  illness,  and 
had  himself  announced  the  birth  of  the  dauphin  to  him.  When 
the  queen  sought  to  console  the  king,  he  replied  that  he  should 
never  forget  the  sacrifices  which  Monsieur  de  Maurepas  had 
made  for  him,  in  leaving  his  estates  and  the  agreeable  life  which 
he  could  there  have  led,  to  come  to  serve  him  as  a  father. 

Who  was  to  receive  this  difficult  heritage?  The  subject  had 
occupied  many  minds  for  a  long  time,  as  the  age  of  the  prime 


D'ORMESSON    AS    COMPTROLLER-GENERAL.  273 

minister  warranted  neither  long  hopes  nor  long  years.  Some 
named  the  Due  de  Nivernais,  whom  the  king  of  Prussia  favoured, 
so  it  was  said.  Others  inclined  toward  Sartines,  toward  Ma- 
chault,  toward  D'Ossun.  Choiseul  or  Necker  were  again  spoken 
of,  —  the  two  whom  an  epigram  called  "receipt  and  expenditure." 
Madame  Adelaide,  again  in  favour,  urged  the  Cardinal  de  Bernis. 
The  queen,  who  kept  a  vigilant  watch  on  this  point,  and  who,  a 
chronicler  said,  "  had  the  delicacy  not  to  wish  to  share  with  any 
one  an  intimacy  which  she  flattered  herself  she  alone  merited, 
both  by  her  zeal  for  the  State  and  her  attachment  to  the  king, 
and  by  the  purity  of  her  views," — the  queen  would  have  pre- 
ferred the  archbishop  of  Toulouse,  Lomenie  de  Brienne,  a 
friend  of  Vermond,  who  had  the  reputation  of  being  an  eminent 
administrator;  but  she  dared  not  propose  him,  knowing  her 
husband's  absolute  repugnance  to  invest  any  one  with  so  impor- 
tant a  title,  and  his  extreme  fear  of  being  governed.  She  was 
not  wrong;  Louis  XVI.  took  no  prime  minister,  and  Maurepas 
had  no  successor.  Vergennes,  the  principal  personage  in  the 
cabinet,  became  the  directing  minister,  without,  however,  having 
the  title. 

Joly  de  Fleury  had  succeeded  Necker,  and  was  minister  of 
finance;  but  having  neither  the  cleverness  nor  popularity  of  his 
predecessor,  he  soon  fell  beneath  the  weight  of  his  many  mis- 
takes. U'Ormesson,  who  took  his  place  on  the  express  desire  of 
the  king,  with  the  title  of  comptroller-general,  which  was  re-estab- 
lished for  him,  joined  to  a  name  made  illustrious  in  Parliament 
a  reputation  for  integrity  beyond  proof.  He  was  only  thirty-one 
years  old,  and  alleged  his  youth  and  inexperience  as  an  excuse 
for  refusing  the  perilous  post  which  was  offered  him.  "  I  am 
younger  than  you,"  Louis  XVI.  replied ;  "  and  my  position  is 
more  difficult  than  the  one  I  confide  to  you."  Marie  Antoinette 
was  pleased  at  this  appointment;  and  the  approbation  which  she 
openly  expressed  was  the  more  meritorious  in  that  D'Ormesson 
had  not  hesitated  to  expose  himself  to  her  displeasure.  Before 
his  appointment  as  comptroller-general,  a  historian  relates,  he 
had  come  in  direct  opposition  to  the  queen  in  his  quality  as 
councillor  of  State  charged  with  the  direction  of  St.  Cyr.  The 
queen  having  recommended  some  young  persons  to  him  whom 
she  wished  to  have  placed  in  that  house,  he  had  laid  before  the 
king  a  list  which  contained  their  names,  and  on  the  margin  that 
of  their  protectress ;  but  on  the  same  list  he  had  presented  other 
VOL.  i. —  1 8 


2/4  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

young  persons,  without  support,  whose  rights  he  advocated,  and 
Louis  XVI.  had  chosen  the  latter. 

D'Ormesson  brought  to  his  office  the  same  austerity  of  prin- 
ciple and  the  same  disinterestedness  that  he  had  shown  in  the 
government  of  St.  Cyr.  Unfortunately,  in  so  delicate  a  matter 
neither  honesty  nor  determined  energy  could  take  the  place  of 
acquired  experience.  D'Ormesson  made  mistakes ;  his  ill-con- 
trived operations  displeased  business  men ;  his  probity  irritated 
the  courtiers.  They  ridiculed  his  honesty;  and  at  the  end  of 
seven  months  he  was  obliged  to  retire. 

Intrigues  were  again  on  foot ;  many  names  were  advanced : 
Se"nac  de  Meilhan,  intendant  of  Hainaut;  Foulon,  former  inten- 
dant  of  Paris;  Lomenie  de  Brienne,  archbishop  of  Toulouse.  It 
was  the  intendant  of  Flanders,  Monsieur  de  Calonne,  who  won ; 
he  was  named  comptroller-general  on  Oct.  23,  1783. 

Twenty  years  before,  a  minister  of  Louis  XV.,  Monsieur  de 
Boynes,  had  r written  the  following  lines  concerning  this  per- 
sonage :  — 

"  Whatever  one  may  say  concerning  Monsieur  de  Calonne,  I  still  sus- 
pend my  judgment  of  him  ;  but  for  the  present  he  seems  to  me  to  be 
a  man  of  more  brilliant  than  solid  parts,  to  be  possessed  of  more  ver- 
satility than  capacity.  I  fear  that  he  owes  his  reputation  to  the  ease 
with  which  he  expresses  himself,  and  to  a  certain  pleasing  air,  which 
succeeds  especially  with  women." 

Monsieur  de  Boynes  was  not  mistaken.  Light,  brilliant,  witty, 
amiable  in  the  full  acceptation  of  the  term,  with  a  handsome  face 
and  a  keen  and  piercing  look,  of  a  well-turned  figure,  a  noble 
and  easy  politeness,  without  haughtiness  or  pretension,  with  a  sort 
of  responsible  air,  which  marked  the  man  in  office,  a  lively  in- 
telligence, fertile  in  expedients  rather  than  in  resource,  clever 
at  intrigue  rather  than  great  enterprises,  more  solicitous  of  his 
elegance  than  his  gravity,  with  a  great  talent  for  work,  but  an  in- 
surmountable horror  of  figures,  and  of  incurable  frivolity,  Monsieur 
de  Calonne  had  all  the  qualities  of  a  man  of  the  world,  but  very 
few  of  those  of  a  statesman,  and  still  less  of  those  of  a  financier. 
He  was  a  genius,  moreover,  who  was  eminently  dangerous,  be- 
cause people  were  easily  taken  in  by  his  deductions,  drawn  from 
false  premises  and  untrustworthy  data,  and  because  his  imagina- 
tion conceived,  and  his  eloquence  caused  to  be  adopted,  measures 
which  neither  good  sense  nor  good  reason  could  countenance. 


APPOINTMENT   OF   CALONNE.  275 

Formerly  favoured  by  Choiseul,  and  successively  intendant  of 
Rennes,  of  Metz,  and  of  Lille,  but  burdened  with  debts,  owing 
everybody,  he  had  scented  the  comptroller-generalship  for  a  long 
time.  On  the  fall  of  Necker,  to  which  he  had  contributed  by  his 
pamphlets,  some  of  which  —  his  "  Why,"  and  his  "  Letter  from 
the  Marquis  Caraccioli  "  —  had  enjoyed  great  success,  he  had 
hoped  to  arrive  at  this  end.  He  played  picquet  with  Madame 
de  Maurepas,  and  courted  Monsieur  de  Maurepas ;  but  the  old 
minister  had  replied  warmly  to  a  person  who  had  spoken  to  him 
of  Calonne  as  a  successor  to  Necker,  "  Fie,  then !  he  is  a  fool,  a 
basket  with  a  hole  in  the  bottom  !  Put  the  finances  in  his  hands  ! 
The  royal  treasury  would  soon  be  as  dry  as  his  purse  !  "  Joly  de 
Fleury,  then  D'Ormesson,  had  been  preferred. 

Calonne,  however,  had  not  been  discouraged.  Repulsed  by 
the  prime  minister,  repelled  by  the  king,  looked  upon  with  dis- 
favour by  the  queen,  he  turned  to  the  capitalists,  to  the  courtiers, 
and  to  the  princes.  He  said,  or  caused  to  be  said,  that  he  alone 
knew  the  means  of  directing  the  finances  of  a  great  monarchy 
so  as  to  bring  abundance  to  the  royal  treasury  without  descending 
to  the  petty  economies  which  had  so  stupidly  depressed  the  court. 
In  a  word,  the  people  would  see  that  he  knew  how  to  conciliate 
the  interests  of  public  and  private  fortune.  It  was  thought  that 
he  had  superior  talents  because  he  treated  the  most  serious  things 
lightly.  The  Comte  d'Artois  was  won  over ;  Madame  de  Polignac 
and  the  Comte  de  Vaudreuil  were  infatuated ;  the  lieutenant  of 
police,  Lenoir,  was  interested ;  the  court  banker,  Monsieur 
d'Harvelay,  whose  wife  was  Calonne's  mistress,  undertook  to  win 
over  Vergennes,  and  when  D'Ormesson  handed  in  his  resignation, 
all  the  batteries  were  ready.  Madame  de  Polignac,  seconded  by 
the  Baron  de  Breteuil,  betook  herself  to  the  queen  to  implore  her 
patronage  for  her  protege.  The  queen  resisted  for  some  time ; 
but  finally,  importuned  by  her  favourite  and  urged  by  a  man 
in  whom  she  had  confidence,  Breteuil,  she  promised,  not  to  advo- 
cate the  appointment  of  Monsieur  de  Calonne,  but  to  confer  with 
the  king  concerning  it  on  the  following  day;  and  on  that  day  the 
appeals  of  Madame  de  Polignac,  the  importunities  of  Monsieur 
de  Vaudreuil,  of  the  Due  de  Coigny,  and  of  the  Comte  d'Artois, 
the  complaisance  and,  it  was  thought,  the  secret  support  of  Mon- 
sieur de  Vergennes,  wrung  from  the  two  sovereigns  the  nomina- 
tion of  a  man  for  whom  they  had  neither  taste,  liking,  nor  esteem, 
but  who  had  the  sympathies  of  "  beautiful  women." 


276  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

The  queen  soon  repented ;  she  was  provoked  with  Madame  de 
Polignac  for  her  intervention  in  the  affair,  and  did  not  hide  hei 
displeasure.  One  day  she  allowed  herself  to  say  to  the  duchess 
that  the  finances  had  passed  from  the  hands  of  an  honest  man 
without  talent  to  those  of  a  clever  intriguer.  Calonne  heard  of  it ; 
he  did  everything  to  conquer  the  dislike  of  his  sovereign,  and  to  win 
her  good  grace,  seeking  to  divine  her  smallest  desires,  forestalling 
all  that  she  could  demand,  even  flattering  her  love  for  good  deeds, 
and  endeavouring  to  take  advantage  of  her  charity.  During  the 
very  severe  winter  of  1783  and  1784  the  king  had  given  three  mil- 
lion livres  to  the  poor;  Calonne  had  come  to  the  queen  to  offer 
to  give  her  one  of  them,  in  order  that  she  might  distribute  it  in 
her  name,  and  according  to  her  desire.  The  queen  declined,  and 
replied  that  the  whole  sum  should  be  distributed  in  the  name  of 
the  king;  that  as  for  her,  she  should  deprive  herself  of  certain 
things  in  order  to  add  to  the  relief  of  the  unfortunate  people  as 
far  as  her  savings  would  permit.  When  Calonne  departed,  she 
called  Madame  Campan  and  said  to  her,  "  Congratulate  me ;  I 
have  just  escaped  a  trap,  or  at  least  something  which  in  the  end 
would  have  caused  me  great  annoyance;  "  and  she  added,  "That 
man  will  succeed  in  ruining  the  finances  of  the  State.  They  say 
that  I  appointed  him ;  they  have  made  the  people  believe  that  I 
am  prodigal.  I  have  just  declined  a  sum  from  the  royal  treas- 
ury, and  even  for  the  most  respectable  uses  have  never  desired 
that  any  money  should  pass  through  my  hands." 

Despite  the  efforts  of  the  comptroller-general,  the  queen  was 
inflexible;  the  very  attentions  which  he  affected  to  show  her  re- 
doubled her  aversion  to  him  ;  and  Calonne,  in  his  turn,  obstinately 
repulsed  by  Marie  Antoinette,  became  one  of  her  most  implacable 
enemies.  We  shall  find  proof  of  this  later. 

At  this  moment  the  attention  of  the  young  sovereign  was 
absorbed  by  a  more  important  matter. 

The  restless  ambition  of  Joseph  II.  sought  everywhere  to  en- 
large and  increase  the  influence  of  Austria.  In  1780  one  of  the 
archdukes,  Maximilian,  had  been  elected  coadjutor  of  Cologne. 
Maria  Theresa,  who  was  still  living,  had  appealed,  with  that 
unctuous  and  pressing  insistence  of  which  she  so  well  knew  the 
secret,  to  her  daughter;  she  had  represented  to  her  that  for  her 
own  good  and  that  of  France  it  was  necessary  to  circumvent  the 
evil  intentions  of  Frederick  II..  "  that  wicked  neighbour,  danger- 
ous to  our  '  holy  religion,'  dangerous  to  France  and  Austria, 


ATTEMPT   TO    OPEN   THE   SCHELDT.  277 

whose  interests  were  identical."  Marie  Antoinette,  who  was  still 
very  sensitive  to  everything  that  personally  concerned  her  brothers 
and  sisters,  and  in  particular  Maximilian,  —  Marie  Antoinette, 
who  held  the  king  of  Prussia  "  in  horror,"  had  warmly  espoused 
her  brother's  cause.  She  had  spoken  to  Maurepas  ;  and  Vergennes 
having  made  no  serious  objection,  and  the  king  having  approved, 
the  French  minister  to  Cologne,  the  Comte  de  Chalons,  had  worked 
for  the  archduke,  who  had  been  elected  coadjutor  of  Cologne  and 
of  Miinster,  with  the  future  succession. 

Four  years  later  the  affair  threatened  to  become  more  serious; 
it  was  no  longer  a  question  concerning  the  empire,  but  concerning 
Europe.  Maria  Theresa  was  dead;  and  Joseph  II.  had  neither 
the  wisdom  of  his  mother  nor  the  high  consideration  which  she 
enjoyed  from  the  whole  world.  He  had  even  wounded  French 
sentiment  during  the  American  war,  by  not  sufficiently  hiding 
his  sympathy  with  England,  and  by  announcing  his  intention  of 
visiting  that  country,  which  at  such  a  time  had  also  hurt  Marie 
Antoinette.  None  the  less  it  was  to  his  sister  that  he  turned 
when  his  affairs  became  embroiled. 

The  treaties  of  1715  had  closed  the  mouths  of  the  Scheldt, 
and  given  them  in  charge  of  Holland.  The  emperor  bore  with 
impatience  this  arrangement,  which  was  so  disadvantageous  to 
the  commerce  of  the  Lower  Countries,  and,  above  all,  to  that  of 
Antwerp.  Already  during  the  war  in  America,  he  had  broached 
the  subject  and  had  even  made  overtures  to  France,  who,  while 
not  opposing  any  serious  objection,  had  asked  him  to  wait  until 
after  the  peace.  When  the  peace  was  signed,  he  reopened  the 
affair,  demanded  the  free  navigation  of  the  river,  and  on  the 
refusal  of  the  States-General  gave  the  order  to  one  of  his  ships 
to  force  a  passage.  The  Hollanders  fired  upon  the  ship  and  cap- 
tured it.  Immediately  an  Austrian  army  was  assembled  on  the 
frontier;  and  the  States-General,  in  alarm,  solicited  the  aid  of 
France.  At  Paris  and  Versailles  popular  opinion,  always  preju- 
diced against  the  ambitions  of  the  House  of  Hapsburg,  pro- 
nounced energetically  in  favour  of  Holland.  The  ministers  met 
and  demanded  prompt  action  against  Austria.  And  the  most 
ardent  against  these  projects  of  Joseph  II.  were  those  per- 
sons whom  public  opinion  regarded  as  the  proteges  of  Marie 
Antoinette, — the  minister  of  war,  Segur,  the  minister  of  the 
marine,  Castries,  and  the  former  French  ambassador  to  Vienna, 
the  Baron  de  Breteuil. 


278  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

To  avoid  any  explosion,  the  emperor  wrote  to  his  sister.  As 
early  as  1783  he  had  complained  of  the  unfriendly  disposition 
of  France,  who,  he  said,  too  easily  forgot  the  advantages  which 
she  gained  from  the  Austrian  alliance,  and  wished  to  reserve  to 
herself  alone  all  the  benefits.  In  1784  he  renewed  his  complaints 
and  his  demands.  The  queen  only  opposed  a  plea  in  bar  to  these 
recriminations ;  her  influence,  she  said,  was  far  from  being  as 
strong  as  he  imagined.  Would  it  be  prudent  for  her  to  have 
scenes  with  the  ministers  concerning  an  affair  in  which  she  was 
sure  the  king  would  not  second  her?  Louis  XVI.,  appealed  to, 
in  his  turn,  offered  his  mediation  and  nothing  more.  The  em- 
peror was  displeased  at  this  coldness,  and  did  not  hide  his  indig- 
nation. "  As  long  as  France  was  engaged  in  the  American  war," 
he  said  to  La  Marck,  "  I  abstained  from  pressing  my  rights  upon 
Holland,  although  it  would  then  have  been  difficult  for  France 
to  oppose  them.  They  should  repay  me  at  Versailles  for  the 
confidence  and  moderation  which  I  showed  at  that  time." 

In  the  letter  which  he  addressed  to  his  sister  he  protested 
again  that  he  was  looking  for  no  territorial  aggrandizement  on 
the  side  of  the  Low  Countries,  but  simply  a  reparation  of  the  in- 
sult offered  to  his  flag.  With  the  king  he  was  more  explicit ;  he 
demanded  the  cession  of  the  fortress  of  Maastricht,  and  of  its 
territory,  and  a  few  days  later  he  had  Mercy  communicate  to  the 
cabinet  of  Versailles  a  memorandum  in  which  he  joined  the 
agreement  with  Holland  to  a  project  of  exchange  of  the  Lower 
Countries  for  Bavaria,  —  a  project  to  which,  he  said,  neither  the 
elector-palatine  nor  the  Due  de  Deux-Ponts  would  be  hostile. 

This  was  contrary  to  the  stipulations  of  the  peace  of  Teschen. 
The  king  pointed  this  out  to  the  emperor,  who  renounced  this 
new  pretension. 

But  the  Holland  question  did  not  progress.  The  tempers 
became  bitter  on  both  sides.  The  queen  did  all  she  could  to 
pacify  them ;  she  talked  in  vain  to  the  king,  to  Vergennes,  even 
delaying  sending  a  note  in  the  hope  that  in  the  interval  a  more 
conciliatory  reply  might  arrive  from  Vienna.  The  situation  be- 
came strained.  The  States-General  delayed  payment.  Joseph  II., 
instigated  by  Leopold,  sent  them  his  ultimatum;  and  in  reply,  an 
order  was  given  to  assemble  two  French  corps,  —  one  on  the 
borders  of  the  Rhine,  the  other  on  the  frontiers  of  Flanders,  — 
under  the  orders  of  the  Prince  de  Conde. 

The  queen  was  alarmed  to  the  last  degree ;   her  affections,  her 


SHE   ACTS   AS    MEDIATOR.  279 

interests,  were  at  stake ;  her  heart  and  her  reason  revolted  against 
a  war  which  would  have  been  in  her  eyes  fratricidal ;  she  could 
not  face  without  trembling  the  rupture  of  an  alliance  in  which 
her  mother,  whom  she  still  mourned,  had  accustomed  her  to  see 
the  safeguard  of  the  peace  of  the  world,  the  surest  guarantee  of 
the  happiness  of  the  people,  and  the  support  of  her  holy  religion. 
Its  dissolution  would  have  destroyed  forever  her  happiness  and 
tranquillity.  She  distrusted  Vergennes,  nor  was  she  wrong.  The 
sympathies  of  Vergennes  were  with  Prussia,  to  the  point  of  writing 
this  phrase,  whose  realization  in  this  century  has  produced  the 
sad  results  which  we  know,  "  If  it  be  necessary  to  choose  be- 
tween the  branches  of  the  House  of  Bourbon  in  Italy  and  that  of 
the  Prussian  power  in  Germany,  we  cannot  hesitate  in  abandoning 
the  former  and  maintaining  the  latter." 

The  queen  remarked  that  the  language  of  the  king  when  she 
saw  him  alone,  and  before  any  one  else,  always  differed  from 
that  which  he  used  after  a  conference  with  his  minister.  Might 
she  not  conclude  that  at  bottom  her  husband's  opinion  was  the 
same  as  her  own,  and  that  it  was  Vergennes  who  influenced  him? 
And  if  she  deceived  herself  in  this  opinion,  was  his  apparent 
duplicity  likely  to  enlighten  her?  Consequently  she  determined 
not  to  see  the  king  and  his  minister  in  each  other's  presence, 
and  she  increased  her  efforts  to  arrive  at  a  solution  of  the  diffi- 
culties ;  she  was  in  haste  to  put  an  end  to  them,  and  to  prevent 
any  outbreak ;  she  urged  the  king,  the  ministers,  as  well  as  the 
emperor,  not  to  raise  new  impediments  and  pretensions.  But 
whatever  may  have  been  her  confidence — we  might  say,  her 
illusion  — with  regard  to  the  disinterestedness  of  her  brother, 
she  never  lost  sight  of  the  superior  interests  of  the  country  over 
which  she  reigned.  And  one  day  when  the  ambassador  from 
Sweden,  during  a  private  audience,  led  the  conversation  to  the 
grave  question  of  Holland,  which  was  then  absorbing  the  at- 
tention of  all  courts,  the  queen,  after  having  expressed  herself 
frankly  on  the  subject  in  the  intimacy  of  a  private  conversation, 
added  warmly,  "  Moreover,  you  may  be  very  sure  that  I  shall 
never  interfere  in  anyway,  so  soon  as  a  course  has  been  adopted, 
and  that  under  all  circumstances  I  shall  never  forget,  despite  my 
friendship  for  the  emperor,  that;  I  am  queen  of  France  and 
mother  of  the  dauphin."  And  despite  her  lack  of  sympathy  for 
Vergennes,  she  twice  refused  to  receive  the  Due  de  Choiseul 
and  his  sister,  the  Duchesse  de  Gramont,  who  were  impla- 


280  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

cable  enemies  of  the  minister.  On  the  other  hand,  she  be- 
sought Joseph  II.  to  put  the  king  in  a  position  to  be  able  to 
induce  the  Hollanders  to  make  the  reparation  which  they  owed 
him,  by  reassuring  them  with  regard  to  his  intention  of  conquest 
and  aggrandizement;  and  even  when  she  urged  her  brother  to 
use  firm  language,  it  was  only  in  order  to  arrive  more  quickly 
at  a  solution,  such  was  her  haste  to  dispel  that  phantom  of  war 
which  haunted  her. 

By  means  of  negotiations,  exchange  of  letters  and  despatches, 
they  finally  succeeded  in  formulating  the  following  propositions: 

"  The  emperor  should  renounce  the  opening  of  the  Scheldt ;  the  Hol- 
landers should  offer  a  verbal  reparation  for  the  insult  to  the  Austrian  flag, 
and  should  cede  Maestricht,  but  this  place  being  considered  by  them  as  a 
necessary  bulwark  against  Germany,  the  emperor  should  immediately  cede 
it  back  to  them  for  a  pecuniary  indemnity." 

The  States-General  accepted ;  they  consented  to  make  an  apol- 
ogy, and  immediately  sent  two  deputies,  the  Count  of  Wasse- 
naer  and  the  Baron  of  Leyden,  to  Vienna  to  make  it ;  but  with 
their  commercial  instincts,  they  haggled  over  the  price  they  were 
to  pay.  Joseph  II.  demanded  nine  million  five  hundred  thousand 
florins ;  the  Republic  wished  to  give  only  five  millions.  The 
affair  dragged  along.  The  arrangement,  which  was  fixed  for 
the  1st,  then  for  the  I5th  of  March,  was  put  off  until  the  I5th 
of  September ;  bitterness  was  engendered  ;  the  emperor  grew  im- 
patient at  the  successive  delays ;  the  queen  even  more  so,  —  less, 
she  said,  from  resentment  than  from  a  desire  to  arrive  as  quickly 
as  possible  at  a  good  solution,  and  to  avoid  a  war. 

It  was  necessary  to  come  to  some  conclusion.  France  assumed 
that  part  of  the  debt  which  the  States-General  would  not  pay,  but  at 
the  same  time  assured  herself,  an  historian  has  said,  of  advantages 
greatly  outweighing  the  sacrifice;  and  the  preliminaries  of  the 
peace  were  finally  signed  on  Sept.  20,  1785,  and  were  followed 
six  months  later  by  a  treaty  between  France  and  Holland.  Such 
generosity  was  clever,  and  wise  men  thought  that  they  had  not 
paid  too  dearly  for  the  preservation  of  European  peace,  and  for 
the  maintenance  of  two  alliances,  one  of  which  guaranteed  them 
for  a  long  time  from  a  continental  war,  and  the  other  of  which  had 
so  recently  rendered  important  services  during  the  naval  war  with 
England. 

But  the  public,  which   is  always  short-sighted    in  matters  of 


"THE   MARRIAGE    OF    FIGARO."  281 

policy,  censured  what  seemed  to  them  a  prodigality.  They  held 
Marie  Antoinette  responsible  for  it,  and  asserted  that  she  had  sent 
to  her  brother  millions  from  France,  —  an  unworthy  lie,  which  is 
refuted  by  a  simple  investigation  of  the  facts,  and  which  Joseph 
II.  himself  took  care  to  deny,  when  he  said  on  his  death-bed,  "  I 
am  aware  that  the  enemies  of  my  sister  Antoinette  have  accused 
her  of  having  sent  me  considerable  sums.  I  declare,  on  the  point 
of  appearing  before  God,  that  this  is  an  abominable  calumny." 

Though  not  a  political  affair  like  the  foregoing,  another  affair 
at  this  time  absorbed  all  minds  in  France,  which,  while  seemingly 
of  a  purely  literary  character,  yet  assumed  the  proportions  of  a 
great  political  question,  and  caused  more  ink  to  be  spilled,  more 
remarks  to  be  circulated,  more  diplomacy  to  be  used,  and  more 
intrigues  to  be  concerted,  than  if  a  treaty  between  two  powers  had 
been  in  question.  There  were,  in  truth,  two  powers  in  opposi- 
tion, —  the  ancient  power  of  the  monarchy,  the  newer  power  of 
public  opinion.  Should  the  new  comedy  of  Beaumarchais, 
"The  Marriage  of  Figaro,"  be  played?  Such  was  the  problem 
which  occupied  the  salons  and  the  academies.  The  piece  had 
been  accepted  at  the  Theatre  Fran^ais  at  the  end  of  1781  ; 
but  the  censorship  had  prohibited  its  representation,  and  at 
the  beginning  of  1784  the  representation  had  not  yet  taken 
place.  The  king  had  commanded  Madame  Campan  to  read 
the  manuscript  to  him,  in  the  queen's  presence;  he  had  been 
profoundly  disgusted  with  the  libertine  tone  which  prevailed, 
and  at  the  attacks  without  number  which  the  piece  contained  on 
the  administration  and  institutions  of  the  country,  and  against 
the  majority  of  received  ideas,  which  formed  the  basis  of  the 
then  national  order.  His  good  sense  understood  the  peril  of 
such  insinuations,  emphasized  and  annotated  by  the  factious 
spirit  of  the  epoch.  At  the  tirade  against  State  prisons  he  rose 
brusquely.  "  It  is  detestable,"  he  cried,  "  and  shall  never  be 
played.  The  Bastille  would  first  have  to  be  destroyed  if  the 
piece  were  to  be  free  from  dangerous  consequences.  The  man 
mocks  at  everything  one  should  respect  in  a  government"  "  The 
piece  shall  not  be  played?"  the  queen  asked.  "No,  certainly 
not,"  replied  Louis  XVI. ;  "  you  may  depend  upon  it."  But 
Beaumarchais  had  said,  "The  piece  shall  be  played;"  and  it  was 
Beaumarchais  who  won  the  day.  He  had  the  king  and  keeper  of 
the  seals  against  him,  but  he  had  the  public  and  a  part  of  the 
court  with  him.  A  dexterous  and  experienced  intriguer,  he  had 


282  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

awakened  public  opinion  by  underhand  means,  by  tiny  rumours 
adroitly  spread,  thanks  to  the  complicity  of  some  and  the  stupidity 
or  vanity  of  others,  and  excited  curiosity.  Every  one  wished  to 
know  the  work  at  which  the  ministers  took  umbrage;  and  if  the 
representation  were  prohibited,  it  was  not  forbidden  to  read  it. 
Beaumarchais,  while  appearing  to  withdraw,  like  Virgil's  nymph, 
and  to  refuse  out  of  consideration  for  the  will  of  the  king,  was 
enchanted  to  yield  to  wishes  so  vehemently  expressed ;  he  him- 
self read  it,  and  every  one  sought  to  obtain  the  favour  of  listening 
to  him,  either  in  his  own  house  or  in  the  most  brilliant  salons. 
Neither  bishops  nor  archbishops  disdained  to  appear  among 
the  audience ;  each  day,  Madame  Campan  relates,  we  heard, 
"  I  was  present,  or  I  am  to  be  present,  at  a  reading  of  Beau- 
marchais's  piece."  Being  a  man  who  neglected  no  detail, 
the  author  had  prepared  for  these  sessions  an  elegant  manu- 
script bound  with  pink  favours,  on  which  was  written,  in  large 
characters,  "A  Comic  Tract"  "A  singular  title,"  Monsieur  de 
Lomenie  has  justly  remarked,  "for  a  voluminous  comedy  in 
five  acts,  which  was  a  sort  of  bloodhound  used  to  hunt  down 
the  old  regime."  But  every  one  was  delighted.  The  great  nobles 
were  the  first  to  applaud  the  satire  on  their  manners,  —  the  en- 
gine of  war  directed  not  only  against  their  privileges,  but  against 
their  legitimate  influence.  "  Only  petty  minds  fear  petty  writings," 
Figaro  remarks  in  the  piece.  No  one  wished  to  pass  for  a  petty 
mind.  The  Baron  de  Breteuil,  the  Comte  de  Vaudreuil,  Madame 
de  Polignac,  were  among  the  partisans  of  Beaumarchais.  The 
Princesse  de  Lamballe  sent  the  Due  de  Fronsac  to  him  to  request 
the  favour  of  a  reading  at  her  house,  and  the  clever  comedian 
only  consented  after  much  solicitation.  When  the  Comte  and 
Comtesse  du  Nord  came  to  France,  they  wished  to  hear  "  The 
Marriage  of  Figaro."  "The  piece  interests  us  greatly,"  the  Baroness 
von  Oberkirche  said.  Encouraged  by  alt  this  approbation,  Beau- 
marchais wrote  to  the  lieutenant  of  police  to  demand  again  the 
authorization  of  his  work,  asserting  that  he  had  made  great 
changes  in  it.  The  lieutenant  of  police,  or  rather  the  keeper  of 
the  seals,  turned  a  deaf  ear;  but  in  June,  1783,  the  solicitations 
became  more  pressing,  and  permission  was  granted.  The  actors 
of  the  Comedie  Franchise  received  orders  to  study  the  piece;  and 
the  first  gentleman  of  the  bedchamber  authorized  Monsieur  de  la 
Ferte  to  lend  the  Hotel  des  Menus-Plaisirs  for  the  representation. 
Tickets  were  distributed  to  all  the  court;  carriages  already 


"MARRIAGE   OF    FIGARO"   PRIVATELY   PLAYED.      283 

thronged  the  entrance  of  the  theatre ;  the  hall  was  half  filled ; 
at  the  last  moment  the  representation  was  forbidden  by  a  lettre  de 
cachet.  One  can  imagine  the  excitement.  "  This  prohibition  of 
the  king,"  Madame  Campan  said,  "  seemed  like  an  attack  upon 
public  liberty.  So  many  disappointed  hopes  excited  the  discon- 
tent to  such  a  point  that  the  words  '  oppression '  and  '  tyranny ' 
were  never  pronounced  with  more  vehemence,  even  during  the 
days  which  preceded  the  fall  of  the  throne." 

Louis  XVf .  imagined  that  he  was  acting  vigorously ;  he  did 
not  maintain  it,  and  it  was  but  an  act  of  weakness.  He  himself 
was  mistrustful  of  his  steadfastness.  "  You  will  see,"  he  said, 
one  day,  "  that  Monsieur  Beaumarchais  will  be  more  powerful 
than  the  keeper  of  the  seals."  A  singular  sign  of  the  time,  and 
a  more  singular  sign  of  character,  this  saying  of  a  sovereign  who 
held  his  own  authority  and  that  of  his  ministers  so  cheap.  More- 
over, he  was  not  mistaken;  three  months  after  this  interdiction, 
the  piece  was  given,  not  yet  in  public,  but  before  a  part  of  the 
court,  and  in  the  presence  of  the  king's  brother.  It  was  Monsieur 
de  Vaudreuil  who,  wishing  to  give  a  novel  and  piquant  entertain- 
ment at  his  house  at  Gennevilliers,  had  undertaken  to  obtain  the 
revocation  of  the  prohibition.  How  did  he  obtain  it?  We  do 
not  know ;  only  one  thing  is  certain,  and  that  was  the  vehemence 
of  the  desire  of  that  frivolous  society.  "  Without  '  The  Marriage 
of  Figaro'  there  is  no  safety,"  Vaudreuil  wrote  to  the  Due  de 
Fronsac,  and  the  latter  despatched  a  courier  with  all  speed  to 
Beaumarchais,  who  was  then  in  England,  in  order  to  satisfy  the 
impatience  of  his  friend,  "  of  the  ladies,"  and  of  the  Comte 
d'Artois. 

The  breach  was  made.  "  The  presence  of  Monseigneur  le 
Comte  d'Artois  and  the  real  merit  of  your  charming  piece  finally 
destroyed  every  obstacle  that  had  retarded  its  representation, 
and  consequently  its  success,"  Monsieur  de  Vaudreuil  wrote  to 
the  author.  There  was  no  longer  question  of  anything  but  to 
find  an  excuse  for  the  production  of  the  piece.  The  excuse 
was  found.  The  king,  assailed  by  solicitations,  replied  that  there 
were  still  things  which  must  not  remain  in  the  work ;  that  new 
censors  must  be  nominated ;  and  that  the  author  would  the  more 
readily  make  the  excisions,  as  the  piece  was  long.  This  was  to 
capitulate.  The  new  censors  did  not  deceive  themselves ;  they 
demanded  certain  unimportant  modifications ;  and  on  April  27, 
1784,  "The  Marriage  of  Figaro"  was  played  at  the  Theatre 


284  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

Frangais.  Louis  XVI.  thought  that  it  would  fail ;  convinced 
that  the  cuts  which  had  been  exacted  would  destroy  all  the 
interest,  and  detract  from  the  spiciness  of  the  piece,  he  demanded 
of  Monsieur  de  Montesquieu,  "  Well,  what  do  you  think  of  the 
success?  "  "  Sire,  I  hope  that  the  piece  will  fail."  "  And  I  too," 
the  king  replied.  "  Yes,"  Sophie  Arnould  said,  "  it  is  a  piece  to 
fail  fifty  times  running." 

We  know  which  was  right,  Louis  XVI.  or  Madame  Arnould. 
"  There  is  only  one  thing  more  ridiculous  than  my  piece,"  Beau- 
marchais  himself  said,  "  and  that  is  its  success."  Who  does  not 
know  the  picture  of  that  first  night?  All  Paris  thronged  to  the 
entrances  of  the  theatre ;  the  blue  ribbons  were  lost  in  the  crowd, 
and  rubbed  elbows  with  the  Savoyards;  the  guards  were  dis- 
persed, the  doors  forced,  the  iron  grilles  broken,  by  the  efforts  of 
the  mob ;  the  audience-hall  was  crowded  ;  Monsieur  himself  was 
there  with  full  equipage  ;  the  parterre  and  the  boxes,  aggressive 
or  frivolous,  greeted  with  noisy  acclamations  all  those  witty  and 
cynical  tirades,  audaciously  aimed  against  the  established  order 
of  things  ;  and  at  the  back  of  a  grated  box,  three  men,  whose 
names  personify  three  of  the  powers  of  that  time,  literature, 
Parliament,  and  government,  —  Beaumarchais,  the  Abbe  Sabat- 
tier,  the  Abbe  de  Calonne,  —  assembled  after  a  gay  dinner  to 
enjoy  together  the  success  which  had  been  so  long  expected,  or 
rather  to  assist  gayly  at  that  tumult  which  was  but  the  prelude 
and  image  of  the  assault  directed  against  the  monarchy. 

What  part  had  the  queen  taken  in  this  affair?  It  is  difficult  to 
know  exactly.  Madame  Campan  asserts  that  she  showed  her 
displeasure  against  all  the  persons  who  had  aided  the  author  of 
"  The  Marriage  of  Figaro  "  to  surprise  the  king's  consent  to  the 
production  of  his  comedy.  On  the  other  hand,  the  latest  histo- 
rian of  Beaumarchais,  Monsieur  de  Lomenie,  quotes  a  letter  from 
the  Due  de  Fronsac  to  Papillon  de  la  Ferte,  which  contains  this 
phrase,  "  The  queen  said  to  me  that  the  king  had  consented  to 
allow  'The  Marriage  of  Figaro'  to  be  played  at  Gennevilliers." 
Was  Marie  Antoinette  simply  charged  to  repeat  the  king's  word 
to  Messieurs  de  Fronsac  and  de  Vaudreuil?  Had  she  been  her 
brother-in-law's  and  her  friend's  advocate  with  her  husband? 
Monsieur  de  Lomenie  inclines  toward  the  latter  hypothesis,  and 
therefore  contradicts  Madame  Campan.  It  seems  to  us  that  the 
two  opinions  are  not  entirely  irreconcilable.  It  maybe,  although 
it  is  by  no  means  proved,  that  yielding  to  the  importunities  of 


SHE   PLAYS    IX    -'THE    BARBER    OF    SEVILLE."         285 

her  set,  the  queen  aided  Monsieur  de  Vaudreuil  to  obtain  from 
Louis  XVI.  the  permission  which  he  solicited.  But  it  is  highly 
probable  also  that  she  believed,  as  Madame  Campan  affirms,  that 
Beaumarchais  had  made  great  changes  in  his  work,  as  he  boasted 
in  his  letter  to  the  lieutenant  of  police ;  that  it  was  with  this  idea, 
and  to  recompense  the  sacrifices  which  the  author  had  made, 
that  she  supported  the  request  which  Monsieur  de  Vaudreuil 
made  on  that  very  pretext,  and  that  afterward,  being  disillusioned 
as  to  the  excisions  which  had  been  made,  she  had  not  concealed 
her  anger  against  those  who  had  thus  lent  themselves  to  deceive 
her  and  to  deceive  the  king.  What  is  certain,  in  any  case,  is  that 
she  was  not  present  at  the  representation  at  Gennevilliers,  and 
that  she  did  not  again  appear  in  any  way  in  the  negotiations 
which  followed  to  obtain  permission  for  a  public  representation, 
for  which  Louis  XVI.,  as  we  have  said,  exacted  the  examination 
of  two  new  censors. 

But  the  queen  was  a  woman ;  she  was  impulsive ;  she  soon, 
even  too  soon,  forgot  offences.  The  king,  in  a  moment  of  anger, 
provoked,  it  is  said,  by  a  complaint  of  Monsieur,  had  sent  Beau- 
marchais, not  to  the  Bastille,  but  what  was  more  humiliating,  to 
St.  Lazare.  The  queen,  as  well  as  the  public,  and  the  king 
himself  when  he  was  calmer,  saw  an  injustice  therein.  She 
wished  to  repair  it  delicately;  she  undertook  herself  to  play  in 
her  little  theatre  at  Trianon,  not  "  The  Marriage  of  Figaro,"  but 
"  The  Barber  of  Seville,"  and  invited  the  author  to  be  present, 
which  was  an  unusual  distinction.  The  rehearsals  were  held  under 
the  direction  of  Dazincourt,  who  had  just  made  a  brilliant  success 
in  "The  Marriage  of  Figaro."  The  performance  took  place  on 
Aug.  19,  1785.  The  queen  played  Rosine ;  she  loved  those  rdles 
of  a  young  woman  who  was  half  naTve,  half  cunning,  innocent 
and  coquettish  at  the  same  time.  The  Comte  d'Artois  played 
Figaro;  Monsieur  de  Vaudreuil,  Almaviva;  the  Due  de  Guiche, 
Bartholo ;  the  Bailiff  of  Crussol,  Basile.  It  was  given  very  pri- 
vately; according  to  Grimm,  it  was  a  success.  The  small  num- 
ber of  spectators  admitted  to  the  representation,  he  wrote,  were 
agreed  that  the  ensemble  was  such  as  one  rarely  sees  in  pieces 
played  by  amateur  actors.  "  One  remarked  especially  that  the 
queen  displayed,  in  the  scene  of  the  fourth  act,  ail  amount  of 
grace  and  truthfulness  which  could  not  have  failed  to  call  forth 
transports  of  applause,  even  for  the  most  obscure  actress.  We 
have  these  details,"  he  added,  "  from  a  severe  and  delicate  judge, 
whom  no  court  prejudice  has  ever  blinded  in  any  way." 


286  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

It  was  a  triumph  for  the  artist,  an  imprudence  for  the  sov- 
ereign. However  small  the  number  of  the  spectators,  the 
rumour  of  such  a  representation  soon  spread  beyond  the  narrow 
circle  wherein  it  should  have  been  confined.  And  it  must  have 
seemed  strange  that  a  prince  of  the  blood  should  hurl — no 
matter  with  what  talent  —  from  the  private  stage  of  the  queen 
those  vehement  ironies  of  Figaro,  which  were  only,  under  a 
gayer  form,  the  eternal  and  endless  protest  of  all  that  is  little 
against  all  that  is  great.  Was  this  but  a  heedless  fancy  on  Marie 
Antoinette's  part,  —  a  thirst  of  pleasure,  the  vanity  of  an  artist, 
or  the  simple  wilfulness  of  a  woman? 

We  believe  that  there  was  something  more  and  better  than  this. 
Perhaps  that  enterprise,  born  in  a  thought  of  kindness  and  of 
reparation  —  such  was  the  opinion  of  Grimm  —  for  an  author  who 
had  been  injuriously  treated,  and  seconded  by  the  attraction  of 
a  favourite  amusement,  may  have  been  carried  to  the  end  by  a 
delicate  sentiment  of  respect  for  herself.  Perhaps  the  queen 
feared  that  if  she  gave  up  a  plan  which  had  already  been  pre- 
pared and  announced,  she  would  seem  to  be  more  touched  than 
was  compatible  with  her  honour  and  dignity  by  the  serious  oc- 
currence which  had  thrown  Paris  into  excitement,  and  which 
popular  malice  was  ready  to  use  against  her.  Four  days  before, 
indeed,  a  thunderbolt  had  fallen  from  the  sky  of  Versailles,  where 
for  some  time  so  many  clouds  had  been  gathering. 

They  were  in  the  midst  of  the  lawsuit  over  the  necklace. 


Madame  de  la  Motte. 


CHAPTER  XX. 

LAWSUIT  OF  THE  NECKLACE. 

AN  intriguing  woman,  a  forger,  and  a  dupe,  —  such  were  the 
principal  authors,  such,  in  three  words,  is  the  summary  of 
the  strange  drama,  or  rather  of  the  immense  swindle,  which  bears 
in  history  the  name  of  the  lawsuit  of  the  necklace. 

The  intriguing  woman  was  the  Comtesse  de  la  Motte-Valois ; 
the  forger,  Retaux  de  Villette ;  the  dupe,  Prince  Louis  de  Rohan, 
archbishop  of  Strasburg,  grand  almoner  of  France  and  cardinal ; 
the  true  victim,  the  queen.  It  was  not  the  first  time  that  rogues 
had  abused  the  name  of  Marie  Antoinette.  In  1777  the  wife  of 
a  treasurer  of  France,  named  Cahouet  de  Villiers,  who  had  been 
formerly  mixed  up  in  the  intrigues  which  had  brought  Madame  du 
Barry  to  court,  had  set  the  example,  and,  in  a  manner,  marked  out 
the  way  for  Madame  de  la  Motte.  Intimately  connected  with  an 
intendant  of  the  queen's  finances,  Monsieur  de  Saint-Charles,  she 
had  succeeded  through  his  aid  in  procuring  a  register  with  Marie 
Antoinette's  arms,  and  some  royal  orders,  signed  in  advance; 
then  by  cleverly  counterfeiting  the  royal  handwriting,  she  had 
forged  false  letters,  wherein  the  young  princess  in  the  most 
familiar  and  affectionate  style  had  begged  her  to  make  the  ac- 
quisition of  various  objects  for  her.  These  notes  and  the  register, 
shown  with  a  certain  mystery,  intimations  dexterously  insinuated 
of  pretended  audiences  obtained  at  Versailles,  had  accredited 
the  opinion  that  Madame  de  Villiers  verily  enjoyed  the  august 
confidence.  Then  pushing  her  audacity  further,  she  forged  new 
letters,  wherein  the  queen  charged  her  to  procure  relatively  large 
sums,  of  which,  she  said,  she  stood  in  pressing  need,  and  which 
she  dared  not  demand  from  the  king.  Duped  by  this  supposed 
credit,  and  anxious  to  oblige  their  sovereign,  the  treasurer  of  the 
Due  d'Orleans,  Berenger,  and  a  banker  named  De  Lafosse  gave 
to  the  woman,  the  first  one  hundred  thousand  £cus,  the  second 
one  hundred  thousand  francs. 


288  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

But  Berenger  had  his  doubts ;  he  communicated  them  to  Mon- 
sieur de  Sartines.  The  fraud  was  discovered,  and  Madame  de 
Villiers  was  arrested.  Mercy  wished  that  information  of  this 
shady  transaction  should  be  sent  to  an  ordinary  justice.  "  Every- 
thing that  touches  the  glory  of  the  queen,"  he  said,  "  should  be  set 
forth  in  the  clearest  light."  But  the  Comte  de  Maurepas  was  op- 
posed to  a  public  trial.  Was  he  afraid  of  the  extent  of  the  scan- 
dal? Did  he  fear,  as  some  persons  insinuated,  that  his  nephew, 
D'Aiguillon,  was  implicated  in  the  affair?  However  that  may 
be,  a  special  commission  was  called  for  the  trial.  Monsieur  de 
Villiers,  though  not  personally  held  responsible,  was  condemned 
to  repay  the  stolen  sums,  and  wa's  ruined  by  the  restitution ;  his 
wife  was  imprisoned  at  St.  Pelagic,  and  the  affair,  after  having 
created  a  little  noise,  was  soon  forgotten.  But  however  bold  that 
enterprise  may  have  been,  what  was  the  miserable  theft  of  four 
hundred  thousand  francs  by  the  side  of  the  gigantic  undertaking 
planned  and  executed  by  Madame  de  la  Motte? 

Jeanne  de  Sainte-Remy-Valois,  Comtesse  de  la  Motte,  was  de- 
scended from  a  baron  of  Sainte-Remy,  the  natural  son  of  Henri  II. 
Her  father,  the  last  representative  of  this  branch  of  royal  origin 
and  former  proprietors  of  the  important  domains  of  Essoye, 
Fontette,  and  Vazelle,  but  whose  family  had  for  a  long  time  been 
reduced  to  poverty,  had  finally  lived  by  hunting  and  highway 
robbery,  and  had  died  in  the  hospital ;  her  mother  had  followed 
a  soldier.  Left  without  resources,  with  a  brother  and  sister 
younger  than  herself,  Mademoiselle  de  Sainte-Remy  had  first  sub- 
sisted on  public  charity.  The  cure  of  her  parish,  moved  with 
compassion  for  the  sad  remnants  of  a  royal  race,  had  recom- 
mended them  to  the  bishop  of  Langres,  Monseigneur  de  la 
Luzerne,  and  to  the  Marquise  de  Boulainvilliers,  the  wife  of  the 
provost  of  Paris,  who  lived  in  the  suburbs  of  Fontette.  The 
prelate  and  the  great  lady  took  an  interest  in  the  children,  placed 
the  son  in  an  educational  institution  at  Bar-sur-Seine,  and  the 
daughters  in  a  school  at  Passy,  where  Madame  de  Boulainvilliers 
took  them  under  her  protection. 

"  Thus  the  last  descendants  of  the  Valois  passed  from  an  almost 
savage  state  to  a  civilized  condition,"  wrote  the  Comte  Beugnot, 
who  had  known  them  well. 

Six  years  later  Jeanne  de  Sainte-R^my  left  the  school  at  Passy, 
and  was  placed  with  a  mistress  to  learn  the  trade  of  a  dressmaker, 
with  whom  she  remained  three  years. 


MARRIAGE  OF   JEANNE   DE   SAINTE-REMY.  289 

Monseigneur  de  la  Luzerne  had  sent  the  orphans'  papers  to 
Cherin.  Cherin  verified  their  genealogy,  and  acknowledged  its 
authenticity;  and  on  a  certificate  made  out  by  him,  the  king 
granted  to  the  son  of  the  Baron  de  Valois  a  pension  of  eight  hun- 
dred francs,  and  free  admission  to  the  navy,  where  he  conducted 
himself  well,  and  rose  to  the  rank  of  lieutenant ;  to  each  of  the 
girls  was  given  a  pension  equal  to  that  of  their  brother,  for  their 
subsistence,  and  at  the  end  of  two  years,  to  be  passed  at  the  house 
of  Madame  de  Boulainvilliers,  a  place  in  the  abbey  of  Yerres, 
near  Montgeron,  then  in  the  abbey  of  Longchamps.  These 
gifts  were  made  in  the  secret  hope  that  the  son  would  take  vows 
in  the  order  of  Malta,  and  that  the  daughters,  once  in  the  con- 
vent, would  never  leave  it. 

But  such  was  not  Mademoiselle  de  Valois's  intention ;  she  had 
no  taste  for  a  religious  life.  One  fine  morning  the  two  sisters 
escaped  from  Longchamps,  and  after  an  eventful  journey  landed 
at  Bar-sur-Aube,  in  the  inn  of  the  Tete  Rouge,  with  six  francs  in 
their  pockets.  A  lady,  Madame  de  Surmont,  moved  with  pity, 
received  them  in  her  house,  and  put  them  for  the  moment  beyond 
reach  of  want. 

Jeanne  de  Sainte-Remy,  without  being  exactly  beautiful,  had 
that  piquant  grace  which  is  often  more  attractive  than  beauty. 
Her  figure  was  of  medium  height,  but  slender  and  well-formed ; 
her  mouth  was  large,  but  was  furnished  with  good  teeth ;  her  eyes 
blue,  hidden  beneath  black  eyelashes ;  her  hand  well  made ;  her 
foot  very  small ;  her  complexion  of  remarkable  whiteness ;  her 
smile  enchanting.  With  no  education,  but  of  a  lively  and  pene- 
trating mind,  of  a  bold  and  enterprising  character,  affecting  at 
need  timidity  and  gentleness,  but  resolute  in  pursuing  her  end, 
without  principles  to  bother  her,  she  was  tenacious  of  pleasing, 
and  she  pleased.  A  nephew  of  Madame  de  Surmont,  the  Comte 
de  la  Motte,  who  was  serving  in  the  gendarmerie,  was  then  on  his 
vacation  with  his  family ;  at  the  end  of  a  few  months,  on  June  6, 
1780,  a  forced  marriage  made  him  the  husband  of  a  descendant 
of  Henri  II.  He  brought  to  his  wife  a  fine  name,  an  expression 
of  face  which  was  exceedingly  amiable,  despite  his  ugliness,  many 
debts,  and  few  scruples,  great  dexterity  in  bodily  exercise,  and  a 
mind  inclined  to  adventure. 

It  was  necessary  to  live,  and  they  only  had  a  pension  of  eight  hun- 
dred livres.  Madame  de  Surmont  had  turned  the  young  couple  oul 
of  her  house.  A  sister  of  Madame  de  la  Motte,  Madame  de  Latour, 
VOL.  i.  — 19 


290  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

to  whose  house  they  went  during  their  first  perplexity,  "  having 
herself  somewhat  less  than  was  necessary  to  keep  her,  was  not  long 
able  to  maintain  them."  The  husband  rejoined  his  regiment  at 
Luneville  and  at  Nancy.  But  poverty  overtook  them ;  they  re- 
solved to  fall  back  upon  Cherin's  certificate,  and  the  memory  of 
the  Valois.  They  had  recourse  to  Madame  de  Boulainvilliers, 
who,  ever  kindly  disposed  toward  her  protegee,  presented  her  in 
the  month  of  September,  1781,  to  the  grand  almoner  of  France, 
Cardinal  de  Rohan,  who  was  at  that  time  at  his  chateau  of 
Saverne. 

This  was  the  first  step  ;  but  Madame  de  la  Motte  aimed  at  more. 
In  the  month  of  November  of  the  same  year  Monsieur  de  la  Motte 
handed  in  his  resignation,  and  the  two  set  out  for  Paris,  —  that 
great  refuge  for  all  plotters  and  declassts.  Misfortune  there  pursued 
them ;  they  had  scarcely  arrived  before  their  protectress,  Madame 
de  Boulainvilliers,  died  of  small-pox.  Madame  de  la  Motte,  how- 
ever, was  not  discouraged ;  she  and  her  husband  installed  them- 
selves in  a  miserable  lodging-house  in  the  Rue  de  la  Verrerie,  — 
the  H6tel  de  Rheims,  —  where  they  lived  by  expedients,  and  suf- 
fered many  privations.  She  multiplied  her  efforts  :  she  obtained 
for  Monsieur  de  la  Motte  a  place  as  supernumerary  in  the  Light 
Guards  of  Monsieur  d'Artois,  had  an  audience  with  the  Mar6chal 
de  Richelieu,  betook  herself  to  Versailles,  and  there  engaged  a 
furnished  room ;  she  penetrated  even  to  the  waiting-room  of 
Madame,  where  she  feigned  to  fall  in  a  faint,  and  received  from 
the  princess,  who  was  moved  with  pity,  a  few  louis  ;  she  appealed 
to  every  one,  —  to  Monsieur  d'Ormesson,  to  Monsieur  de  Calonne, 
to  the  Duchesse  d'Orleans,  —  and  obtained  a  few  small  sums,  alms 
rather  than  presents ;  she  failed  with  the  Comtesse  d'Artois,  but, 
despite  her  failures,  still  dreamed  of  even  reaching  the  queen;  in 
the  mean  while  she  went  to  Luciennes,  to  solicit  from  Madame  du 
Barry  a  position  as  companion,  or  at  least  that  she  should  hand 
a  petition  to  the  king;  then  finally,  overwhelmed  with  debts,  and 
receiving  but  vague  promises  or  meagre  succour,  not  knowing  to 
what  saint  to  pray,  she  turned  to  the  nobleman  to  whom  her  pro- 
tectress had  recommended  her,  and  in  the  month  of  June,  1782, 
requested  an  audience  of  the  Cardinal  de  Rohan.  She  saw  him, 
pleased  him,  moved  him  by  the  picture  she  drew  of  her  misery, 
returned  to  see  him.  With  her  keen  and  penetrating  mind,  she 
soon  took  his  measure,  and  feeling  that  she  had  found  in  that 
vain,  prodigal,  and  libertine  prelate  a  mine  which  was  as  abun- 


THE  CARDINAL   DE   ROHAN.  291 

dant  as  it  was  easy,  attached  herself  to  him,  and  did  not  leave  him 
again. 

Louis  Rene  Edouard,  Prince  and  Cardinal  de  Rohan,  grand  al- 
moner of  France,  was  then  only  coadjutor  of  his  uncle,  the  bishop 
of  Strasburg,  and  was  known  under  the  name  of  Prince  Louis. 
He  had  been  nominated  in  1771  ambassador  to  Vienna,  thanks 
to  the  influence  of  two  members  of  his  powerful  house,  —  the 
Comtesse  de  Marsan  and  the  Prince  de  Soubise.  A  sufficiently 
bad  reputation  had  preceded  him,  and  Maria  Theresa  was  tempted 
for  a  moment  to  refuse  to  receive  "  that  wicked  fellow,"  "  who 
was  more  of  a  soldier  than  a  coadjutor,"  as  the  queen  said. 
Light-minded,  inconstant,  of  a  character  inclined  to  intrigue,  lib- 
eral and  magnificent  even  to  prodigality,  without  judgment  or 
principle,  but  with  a  noble  mien,  the  attractive  exterior  of  a  man  of 
the  world,  and  the  fine  manners  of  a  man  of  race,  the  Prince  de 
Rohan  was  at  the  same  time  the  idol  of  women,  and  a  subject  of 
scandal  for  serious  people.  His  conduct  in  Austria  did  not  belie 
the  opinion  which  had  been  formed  of  him.  He  sought  at  first  to 
conciliate  the  good  graces  of  the  empress  by  affecting  an  almost 
puritanical  reserve ;  but  the  constraint  which  he  imposed  upon 
himself  did  not  last,  and  at  the  end  of  two  months  Maria  Theresa 
wrote,  — 

"  I  cannot  give  my  approbation  to  the  ambassador,  Rohan  ;  he  is  a  big 
volume,  stuffed  full  of  evil  remarks,  ill  suited  to  his  position  as  ecclesi- 
astic and  minister,  which  he  scatters  abroad  impudently  on  every  occasion ; 
without  knowledge  of  affairs  or  sufficient  understanding ;  with  a  fund  of 
levity,  presumption,  and  inconsequence.  One  cannot  rely  either  upon  his 
explanations  or  his  reports.  The  majority  of  his  following  is  the  same, 
without  merit  and  without  manners.  I  do  not  say  this  to  you  with  the 
intent  of  having  you  demand  his  recall,  but  if  his  court  should  recall  him 
of  its  own  accord,  I  should  be  very  well  content." 

During  two  years  there  were  the  same  complaints  against  "  this 
wicked  fantastic,  full  of  extravagances  and  folly,"  who  respected 
nothing,  not  even  his  holy  calling,  and  who  himself  cynically 
spoke  of  his  priesthood.  The  behaviour  of  the  persons  con- 
nected with  the  embassy  was  not  more  orderly  than  that  of  the 
ambassador ;  valets  and  master  were  in  accord. 

While  the  former  maltreated  the  secretaries  of  the  court, 
knocked  the  sentinels  of  the  palace  beneath  their  horses'  hoofs, 
struck  the  peasants  of  the  surrounding  country  with  their  whips, 
got  beaten  in  their  turn,  and  by  their  perpetual  provocations 


292  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

aroused  all  the  old  national  prejudices  against  the  French,  the 
latter  used  his  privileges  as  ambassador  to  carry  on  smuggling, 
which  did  not  prevent  his  being  overwhelmed  with  debts,  not- 
withstanding his  great  fortune  and  rich  abbeys,  traversed  in  a 
hunting-costume  a  Corpus  Christi  procession,  braved  opinion, 
set  the  empress  at  defiance,  forged  letters  from  Maria  Theresa, 
flooded  the  court  of  Versailles,  the  salons  of  Paris,  even  those  of 
Vienna,  with  wicked  and  scandalous  stories  against  the  mother 
and  daughter,  and  succeeded  in  exciting  the  ill-humour  of  the 
emperor  against  the  dauphiness.  His  secretary,  the  Abbe 
Georgel,  a  former  Jesuit,  a  designing  and  vindictive  man,  aided 
him  well  in  his  work  of  propagating  calumny  and  forging  letters. 

Things  came  to  such  a  pass  that  Maria  Theresa  feared  the 
rancour  of  Prince  Louis  for  her  daughter;  and  the  ardour  with 
which  she  desired  his  departure  even  left  her  indifferent  as  to 
who  his  successor  might  be.  On  the  other  hand,  society  in 
Vienna  did  not  conceal  its  sympathy  for  a  personage  whose 
large  expenditures,  lavish  hospitality,  and  gallant  manners 
dazzled  them.  All  the  women,  young  or  old,  beautiful  or  ugly, 
were  infatuated  with  him.  Joseph  II.  himself,  although  he  de- 
spised him,  found  his  "  gossip  and  conundrums"  amusing;  and 
Kaunitz,  more  solicitous  for  the  interests  of  politics  than  of 
morals,  was  very  well  content  with  a  minister  whose  levity  "  did 
not  disturb  him." 

The  assertion  has  been  made  that  the  Prince  de  Rohan  was  a 
victim  to  Austria's  resentment,  and  was  sacrificed  by  Marie  An- 
toinette because  he  had  discovered  the  imperial  policy.  The 
reply  to  this  assertion  of  certain  historians  is  to  be  found  in  this 
phrase  of  Maria  Theresa :  "  The  ambassador  Rohan  is  always 
the  same :  the  emperor  and  Kaunitz  like  him  well  enough ;  the 
one  amuses  himself  by  making  him  talk  nonsense,  the  other  is 
content  with  his  lack  of  capacity."  The  truth  is  that  the  future 
hero  of  the  lawsuit  over  the  queen's  necklace  was  no  better 
diplomat  than  he  was  an  orderly  prelate,  and  that  Marie  An- 
toinette, in  manifesting  toward  him  under  all  circumstances  an 
invincible  antipathy,  was  not  paying  off  old  family  grudges,  but 
was  only  yielding  to  the  natural  repugnance  of  an  upright  mind 
for  a  priest  so  little  worthy  of  his  calling.  The  Due  d'Aiguillon 
himself  valued  his  agent  at  his  proper  worth;  and  if  Prince  Louis 
kept  a  post  which  he  filled  so  badly,  it  was  owing  to  the  same 
causes  which  had  placed  him  there,  —  to  family  influence,  and  to 


DE    ROHAN    IS   MADE   CARDINAL.  293 

the  intrigues  of  the  Prince  de  Soubise  and  of  the  Comtesse  de 
Mars  an. 

His  favour  diminished  on  the  accession  of  Louis  XVI. ;  and 
one  of  the  first  acts  of  the  new  sovereign  was  to  recall  the 
ambassador  who,  the  queen  said,  "  dishonoured  France  more 
than  he  scandalized  Austria."  The  ladies  of  Vienna  were  in 
despair,  and  only  consoled  themselves  by  wearing  the  picture  of 
their  favourite  mounted  in  a  ring. 

Joseph  II.  and  Kaunitz  had  their  reasons  for  regret.  Certain 
steps  were  taken  at  Versailles  with  the  view  of  obtaining  for  him 
a  continuance  in  the  office  of  ambassador,  or  at  least  some  deci- 
sive mark  of  favour.  The  king  was  inflexible :  he  refused  to 
receive  the  Prince  de  Rohan ;  the  queen  would  not  speak  to 
him.  A  pension  of  fifty  thousand  livres  to  pay  his  debts,  until 
he  should  come  into  possession  of  his  bishopric  of  Strasburg, 
was  the  only  indemnity  he  received  for  his  disgrace.  But  the 
Rohans  were  not  discouraged;  their  ambition,  ever  on  the  alert 
for  the  advancement  of  him  on  whom,  they  thought,  rested 
the  best  chances  for  their  house,  lost  no  means  of  influence. 
The  Prince  de  Soubise,  the  Princesse  de  Guemenee,  her  daughter, 
then  high  in  favour  with  the  queen,  especially  the  Comtesse  de 
Marsan,  who  was  the  soul  of  all  these  intrigues,  and  who,  despite 
the  diminution  of  her  favour,  always  preserved  in  the  eyes  of 
Louis  XVI.  the  prestige  of  her  former  office  as  governess  to 
the  Children  of  France,  united  their  efforts,  either  in  France  or 
abroad,  to  heap  upon  the  head  of  Prince  Louis  every  dignity 
and  honour. 

Success  crowned  so  much  perseverance ;  the  king  of  Poland, 
"  a  worthy  protector  of  such  a  protege,"  as  Maria  Theresa  said, 
obtained,  in  default  of  the  king  of  France,  who  refused  to  make 
the  demand,  a  cardinal's  hat  for  the  coadjutor  of  Strasburg. 
The  Sorbonne  made  him  its  head-master  on  Jan.  31,  1782,  al- 
though he  was  not,  to  use  the  language  of  that  time,  "  of  the 
house,"  and  was  accused  of  many  scandals  in  his  youth,  and  of 
being  scarcely  orthodox  in  his  doctrine;  and  Louis  XVI.  him- 
self, tormented  by  his  former  governess,  bound,  moreover,  by 
a  written  promise  of  his  grandfather,  was  persuaded  in  a  mo- 
ment of  weakness  to  assure  the  reversion  of  the  office  of  grand 
almoner  to  the  prince. 

The  queen  had  striven  in  vain  with  her  husband  to  annul  or 
defeat  the  effect  of  this  imprudent  promise;  in  vain  she  had 


294  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

made  him  give  her  his  word  that  the  coadjutor  of  Strasburg 
should  never  be  grand  almoner  of  France.  On  the  day  following 
the  death  of  the  titulary  of  that  post,  the  Cardinal  de  la  Roche- 
Aymon  and  the  Comtesse  de  Marsan,  warned  by  Maurepas,  went 
to  the  king  on  his  awakening,  and  despite  his  evasions  and  reluc- 
tance wrung  from  him  the  nomination  of  Prince  Louis  to  the 
office  which  had  been  vacant  but  a  few  hours,  with  this  illusory 
condition,  that  he  should  hand  in  his  resignation  at  the  end  of 
a  year.  This  was  the  compromise  which  the  feeble  Louis  XVI. 
conceived  in  order  to  keep  his  promise  to  the  Rohans  without 
breaking  his  word  to  the  queen. 

The  desires  of  the  ambitious  governess  were  satisfied :  her 
favourite  was  grand  almoner,  a  member  of  the  Academic  Fran- 
^aise,  head-master  of  the  Sorbonne,  superior-general  of  the 
Hospital  of  Eighty,  commander  of  the  order  of  the  St.  Esprit, 
while  waiting  to  be  bishop  of  Strasburg,  abbe  of  St.  Waast,  of  La 
Chaise  Dieu,  of  Marmoutiers,  the  possessor  of  eight  hundred 
thousand  livres  of  income  from  his  benefices ;  if  it  were  only 
possible,  this  would  indeed  crown  her  dreams,  —  to  make  him 
prime  minister ! 

"  I  look  upon  it  as  a  very  great  misfortune  that  the  Prince  de 
Rohan  should  occupy  the  position  of  grand  almoner,"  Mercy 
said  ;  "  his  audacity  and  intriguing  may  become  very  dangerous 
to  the  queen."  And  Maria  Theresa  on  her  part  wrote  to  her 
daughter,  — 

"  The  place  that  Rohan  is  to  occupy  distresses  me ;  he  is  a  cruel  enemy, 
as  much  on  your  account  as  because  of  his  own  principles,  which  are  most 
perverse.  Under  an  affable,  easy,  courteous  behaviour,  he  did  much  harm 
at  Vienna ;  and  I  must  see  him  by  the  side  of  the  king  and  of  you.  He 
will  scarce  be  an  honour  to  his  station  as  bishop." 

The  forebodings  of  Mercy  and  Maria  Theresa  were  not  mis- 
taken;  but  it  was  less  the  audacity  of  the  prince  than  his  vanity 
that  became  dangerous.  The  cardinal,  treated  by  Marie  Antoi- 
nette with  marked  coldness,  received  with  ill  favour  when  he  went 
to  make  the  customary  acknowledgments,  irritated,  humiliated, 
wounded  in  his  amour-propre  as  a  great  noble,  his  ambition  as  a 
courtier  alarmed,  —  for  he  felt  that  the  queen's  credit  was  daily 
waxing  greater,  and  that  to  have  her  for  an  enemy  was  to  con- 
demn himself  to  impotence,  —  the  cardinal,  while  his  friends  did 
not  cease  their  campaign  of  secret  machinations,  of  spiteful  re- 


HER   DISLIKE    FOR   DE   ROHAN.  295 

marks,  of  anonymous  attacks,  himself  made  every  possible  effort, 
wrote  letter  upon  letter,  to  gain  the  good-will  of,  and  procure  a 
favourable  reception  from,  the  young  sovereign.  He  only  suc- 
ceeded in  being  importunate  without  inducing  her  to  change  her 
mind  with  regard  to  him. 

The  futility  of  his  endeavours  did  not  discourage  him  ;  and  his 
blind  desire,  irritated  by  failure,  made  him  capable  of  every 
extravagance.  If  we  may  believe  Madame  Campan,  he  had  al- 
ready allowed  himself  to  be  duped  by  a  woman  named  Goupil,  — 
a  consummate  intrigante,  who  had  escaped  from  Salpetriere, 
and  who  had  made  him  believe  that  she  could  reconcile  him  and 
the  queen.  Later,  when  Marie  Antoinette  gave  a  supper  and 
entertainment  to  the  Comte  and  Comtesse  du  Nord  at  Trianon, 
the  cardinal  had  the  presumptuous  fancy  to  introduce  himself 
into  the  garden.  Not  daring  to  ask  permission  of  the  queen,  who 
would  have  refused  it,  he  persuaded  the  concierge  to  allow  him 
to  enter,  by  promising  him  to  remain  in  his  lodge;  but  he  did  not 
keep  his  promise,  and  twice  placed  himself  in  the  way  of  the 
royal  family,  when,  despite  the  redingote  which  he  had  donned 
to  disguise  himself,  his  red  stockings  betrayed  him.  The  queen, 
indignant  at  the  audacity  of  the  prelate  and  the  compliance  of 
the  concierge,  had,  on  the  following  day,  dismissed  the  latter; 
and  the  pressing  solicitations  of  Madame  Campan,  who  was 
touched  by  the  distress  of  a  father  of  a  family,  had  been  neces- 
sary to  reinstate  the  faithless  servant  in  his  position.  But  if  the 
sovereign  consented  to  pardon  the  suborned,  she  neglected  no 
occasion  to  manifest  her  indignation  and  contempt  for  the  sub- 
orner. She  was  not  only  inflexible,  she  was  inaccessible.  Despite 
the  exertions  of  his  family,  despite  his  own  efforts,  the  unfortu- 
nate cardinal  could  not  obtain  a  word  or  a  look  from  her.  All  the 
memorials  of  the  time,  and  the  documents  of  the  trial,  attest  this ; 
never,  we  believe,  was  an  historical  fact  better  established  than 
the  profound,  deliberate,  and  persistent  antipathy  of  Marie 
Antoinette  for  the  Prince  de  Rohan,  and  at  the  same  time,  the 
immoderate  desire  of  the  latter  to  overcome  a  coldness  so  preju- 
dicial to  his  ambition,  so  mortifying  to  his  vanity. 

Things  were  at  this  pass,  and  the  cardinal  was  still  sore  after 
his  recent  escapade  at  Trianon,  when  on  June  24,  1782,  he 
entered  into  relations  with  Madame  de  la  Motte.  How  impor- 
tant was  the  aid  granted  by  the  grand  almoner  to  the  descendant 
of  the  Valois?  Was  it  limited  to  a  few  louis,  granted  from  time 


296  LIFE   OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

to  time,  as  the  cardinal  asserted,  or  did  it  reach  the  considerable 

sum  of  eighty  thousand  livres,  as  Madame  de  la  Motte  affirmed? 

Despite  the  mystery  which  surrounds  this  point,  the  situation 

of  the  La  Mottes,  which  was  so  long  precarious,  their  expedients, 

—  such  as  pawning  their  effects,  the  sale  of  their  pension,  loans, 
etc.,  that  very  mixture  of  outward  magnificence  and  real  distress 
which  is  the  luxury  and    sign  of  the  needy, — would  seem  to 
confirm  the  cardinal's  assertion.     But  at  the  same  time  it  appears 
not  less  certain  that  during  two  years  the  interviews  of  Madame 
de  la  Motte  with  the  bishop  of  Strasburg  were  tolerably  frequent, 

—  more  frequent  than  the  prince  was  willing  later  to  acknowl- 
edge.    Touched    by  the    unfortunate    situation    of  the    woman, 
charmed  by  her  wit,  captivated  by  her  grace,  ensnared  by  her 
cleverness,   he    was  not  long  in   submitting  to   her  charm,  and 
showing  it.     As  early  as  1783  he  became  her  surety  for  a  sum  of 
five  thousand  five  hundred  livres,  borrowed  from  a  Jew  of  Nancy; 
he  recommended  her  to  the  comptroller-general,  gave  her  advice 
on  the  composition  of  the  memorials  which  she  presented  to  the 
king  and  to  the  ministers,  received  her  at  Strasburg,   listened  to 
her  confidences,  and  probably  made  her  his  own. 

At  the  end  of  two  years,  the  interest  which  the  grand  almoner 
took  in  Madame  de  la  Motte,  and  his  confidence  in  her,  were 
sufficiently  established  for  her  to  dare,  one  fine  day,  to  tell  him 
the  following  story :  — 

She  had  finally  reached,  or  at  least  very  nearly  reached,  her 
aim.  Thanks  to  favour  from  a  high  quarter,  the  estates,  the 
fortune,  and  the  rank  of  her  family  were  about  to  be  restored  to 
her ;  and  the  protectress  who  patronized  her  was  no  other  than 
the  queen.  This  princess,  touched  by  the  undeserved  distress  of 
the  granddaughter  of  Henri  II.,  could  not  suffer  one  of  the 
Valois  to  be  reduced  to  so  precarious  a  position.  She  would 
support  the  last  of  the  race ;  she  would  do  more,  she  would 
honour  them  with  her  friendship,  and  grant  them  her  confidence, 
and  did  not  disdain,  in  the  secret  interviews  which  she  had  with 
Madame  de  la  Motte,  to  charge  her  with  the  most  delicate 
commissions. 

Nothing  was  true  in  this  recital ;  and  eighteen  months  later, 

o  o 

Marie  Antoinette  could  affirm  openly  that  this  low  adventuress 
had  never  had  any  position  at  Versailles,  nor  access  to  her. 
Madame  de  la  Motte  herself,  in  her  examination  of  Jan.  20,  1786, 
was  constrained  to  avow  that  she  had  never  had  occasion  or  prc- 


DE  ROHAN  DUPED  BY  MADAME  DE  LA  MOTTE.   297 

text  to  speak  to  the  queen.  Once  only,  on  Feb.  2,  1783,  she  had 
presented  a  petition  to  her;  Marie  Antoinette  had  passed  on 
without  paying  any  attention  to  the  petitioner,  and  had  preserved 
no  memory  of  the  person.  Alone  of  the  royal  family,  Madame 
for  an  instant  had  interested  herself  in  the  granddaughter  of  the 
Valois,  and  had  had  her  pension  of  eight  hundred  livres  increased 
to  fifteen  hundred.  But  at  this  point  the  relations  of  Madame  de 
la  Motte  with  Versailles  had  ceased.  The  cardinal  could  not  have 
been  ignorant  of  this ;  and  although  he  averred  that  his  disgrace 
placed  him  beyond  the  power  of  knowing  these  details,  the  in- 
fluence of  the  Rohans  was  sufficiently  great,  and  their  relations 
with  the  court  sufficiently  frequent,  for  him  to  have  been  able  to 
verify  the  facts  if  he  had  desired.  But  he  does  not  seem  to  have 
thought  of  it  seriously.  Fascinated  by  Madame  de  la  Motte,  he 
believed  all  she  told  him.  To  accomplish  his  captivation,  she 
showed  him,  with  every  appearance  of  mystery,  which  redoubled 
the  importance  of  the  communication,  some  letters  which  she 
pretended  had  been  written  by  the  queen ;  she  committed 
forgery  to  accredit  her  lies.  These  letters  contained  words  of 
kindness  addressed  to  her,  some  familiar  and  affectionate  expres- 
sions, —  "  My  dear  countess,"  "  my  dear  heart."  The  cardinal 
might  have  verified  the  handwriting;  he  did  not  take  the 
trouble  to  do  so. 

From  a  petitioner,  the  clever  woman  posed  as  his  protectress ; 
grateful  for  Monsieur  de  Rohan's  kindness,  she  was  ready  to 
employ  for  his  benefit  the  favour  which  the  kindness  of  Marie 
Antoinette  assured  to  her.  Still  more,  she  had  already  begun ; 
and  the  way  in  which  her  first  overtures  had  been  received,  gave 
her  reason  to  cherish  very  great  hopes  of  ultimate  success.  She 
had  nothing  to  do  but  to  finish  a  work  so  well  under  way,  and 
she  could  not  fail. 

We  easily  believe  what  we  desire.  The  cardinal  was  delighted. 
To  regain  the  good-will  of  the  queen  was  his  dearest  dream. 
How  could  he  doubt  the  word  of  a  woman  who  was  ready  to 
render  him  such  a  service,  —  of  a  woman,  moreover,  it  must  be 
said,  to  whom  he  had  never  done  anything  but  good?  As  a 
consummate  plotter,  Madame  de  la  Motte  took  care  to  keep  the 
credulous  prelate  ever  on  the  alert.  "The  prejudices  of  the 
queen  were  little  by  little  being  overcome ;  her  severity  was 
diminishing;  she  would  even  consent  to  have  Monsieur  de 
Rohan  lay  his  justification  before  her  in  writing."  The  cardinal 


298  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

immediately  hastened  to  draw  up  a  memorial,  wherein  he  stated 
everything  that  was  likely  to  dissipate  the  displeasure  of  his 
sovereign.  The  memorial  was  confided  to  Madame  de  la  Motte; 
and  a  few  days  after,  the  adventuress  brought  a  pretended  reply 
from  the  queen,  thus  worded :  "  I  have  read  your  letter ;  I  am 
charmed  to  find  you  no  longer  culpable.  I  cannot  yet  grant  you 
the  audience  you  desire.  When  circumstances  permit,  I  shalllet 
you  know.  Be  discreet." 

The  cardinal  was  in  transports ;  he  sent  a  few  lines  in  reply  to 
this  note,  wherein  he  lost  himself  in  thanks.  And  from  this 
there  was  established  between  him  and  Marie  Antoinette,  by  the 
intermediation  of  the  countess,  a  supposed  correspondence,  which 
completed  the  deception  of  the  unfortunate  prelate,  —  a  corre- 
spondence filled,  on  the  part  of  the  cardinal,  with  exaggerated 
gratitude,  of  which  nothing  can  give  any  idea,  and  at  the  same 
time  with  the  most  incredible  dreams  of  ambition  ;  while  the  letters 
of  the  queen  expressed  sentiments  of  interest  and  of  confidence. 
These  pretended  letters,  written  on  small  blue  paper,  with  gilt 
edges  and  vignettes,  were  simply  fabricated  under  the  direction  of 
Madame  de  la  Motte  by  a  friend  of  her  husband,  who  had  soon 
become  hers,  and  even  something  more,  under  the  name  of  her 
secretary,  —  Retaux  de  Villette,  a  former  gendarme,  burdened  with 
debts,  accustomed  to  live  by  expedients,  like  the  De  la  Mottes, 
and  like  them  not  very  delicate  as  to  the  choice  of  expedients ;  of 
a  quick  and  insinuating  mind;  a  good  fellow,  moreover,  who  had 
a  certain  smattering  of  art  and  literature,  and  who  threw  himself 
with  sufficient  thoughtlessness  into  this  affair;  for  he  did  not 
even  take  care  to  disguise  his  own  handwriting,  or  to  imitate 
that  of  the  queen.  But  the  cardinal  did  not  examine  too  closely. 
Absorbed  by  his  hopes,  he  saw  nothing. 

Only  one  thing  was  lacking.  The  cardinal  desired  to  have  a 
verbal  assurance  of  that  pardon  which  had  been  given  to  him 
by  letter ;  he  was  eager  to  receive  it  from  the  mouth  of  his  sov- 
ereign. When  would  that  audience  which  had  been  promised 
him  take  place?  Madame  de  la  Motte,  embarrassed,  hesi- 
tated, deferred,  evaded ;  but  the  prelate  became  pressing,  and 
the  countess,  pushed  to  extremities,  at  length  announced  that 
the  queen  consented  to  see  the  grand  almoner.  However,  as  it 
was  not  fitting  for  her  to  give  a  conspicuous  sign  of  her  change 
of  conduct,  which  could  not  fail  to  create  a  good  deal  of  talk  at 
court,  she  would  speak  to  him,  not  in  public,  but  in  the  evening 


MADEMOISELLE    D'OLIVA.  299 

in  the  gardens  of  Versailles.  The  blinded  prelate  believed  all ; 
a  celebrated  charlatan,  who  was  one  of  his  intimates,  and  in 
whom  he  had  absolute  confidence,  —  Cagliostro,  —  had  predicted 
to  him  that  this  happy  correspondence  would  place  him  at  the 
pinnacle  of  his  fortunes,  and  that  his  influence  in  the  government 
would  become  preponderant.  After  this  day,  the  cardinal,  eager, 
anxious,  so  happy  that  he  sometimes  asked  if  he  were  not  the 
puppet  of  a  dream,  with  attentive  ear,  and  eye  ever  on  the  alert,  — 
the  cardinal,  dressed  in  a  long  blue  coat  and  a  large  hat,  walked 
in  the  park  of  the  chateau,  accompanied  by  one  of  the  gentle- 
men of  his  household,  the  Baron  de  Planta,  awaiting  the  blessed 
instant  which  should  decide  his  fortune  and  crown  his  hopes. 

One  evening,  the  24th  of  July,  at  eleven  o'clock,  Madame  de 
la  Motte  came  to  him.  "  Quick  !  "  she  said ;  "  the  queen  permits 
you  to  approach  her!  "  He  ran;  he  flew;  he  hastened  his  steps, 
although  somewhat  stealthily;  he  arrived  in  the  avenue,  near 
which  was  a  hedge ;  he  perceived  a  woman  dressed  in  white,  who 
held  out  a  rose  to  him,  and  murmured  these  words,  "  You  know 
what  this  means."  Then  suddenly  a  man  appeared,  "  Here  come 
Madame  and  Madame  la  Comtesse  d'Artois,"  he  said  in  a  whis- 
per. "  Quick,  quick!  "  Madame  de  la  Motte  cried.  The  woman 
quickly  disappeared  in  the  hedge ;  and  the  cardinal  withdrew, 
convinced  that  he  had  seen  the  queen,  and  dreaming  of  the  most 
brilliant  destiny.  The  interview  had  lasted  only  a  moment;  but 
that  moment  had  well  recompensed  all  his  trouble.  What  had 
really  occurred?  What  was  the  meaning  of  the  scene,  and  who 
was  the  woman? 

During  the  first  days  of  July,  Monsieur  de  la  Motte  had  met 
at  the  Palais  Royal  a  young  woman  whose  resemblance  to  the 
queen  had  struck  him.  This  was  a  girl  named  Le  Guay,  a  fille 
du  monde,  as  one  said  then,  —  a  "  street-walker,"  as  Marie  Antoi- 
nette wrote  somewhat  later,  known  in  the  equivocal  society  in 
which  she  lived  as  Mademoiselle  d'Oliva.  La  Motte  had  followed 
her  to  her  domicile  and  struck  up  an  acquaintance  with  her. 
Seven  or  eight  days  later  he  informed  her  that  a  lady  of  very  great 
distinction  wished  to  see  her,  and  that  he  would  fetch  her  that 
very  evening.  That  evening,  in  fact,  the  lady  in  question,  who 
was  no  other  than  Madame  de  la  Motte,  came  in  her  turn.  "  My 
dear  heart,"  she  said  to  her,  "  you  do  not  know  me ;  but  have 
confidence  in  what  I  am  going  to  tell  you.  I  am  a  lady  attached 
to  the  court."  And  she  added,  "  I  am  hand  in  glove  with  the 


300  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

queen ;  she  has  placed  great  confidence  in  me,  and  has  charged 
me  to  find  her  some  one  who  will  be  disposed  to  do  something 
for  her  when  the  time  comes.  I  have  cast  my  eyes  on  you.  If 
you  will  consent,  I  will  make  you  a  present  of  fifteen  thousand 
francs,  and  the  queen's  gift  will  be  worth  as  much  more."  As 
proof  in  support  of  what  she  said,  she  exhibited  the  famous 
forged  letter  which  had  already  seduced  and  conquered  the  Car- 
dinal de  Rohan.  Surprised  at  a  proposition  of  such  a  nature, 
but  dazzled  by  the  name  of  the  queen,  and  the  prospect  of  a 
protection  of  which  she  had  never  dreamed,  Mademoiselle  d'Oliva 
accepted.  It  was  agreed  that  on  the  following  day  Monsieur  de 
la  Motte  should  call  for  her  in  a  carriage  and  take  her  to  Ver- 
sailles. This  was  done;  at  the  hour  fixed,  Monsieur  de  la  Motte 
went  in  search  of  his  new  friend,  in  company  with  his  colleague, 
Retaux  de  Villette,  and  the  three  set  out  for  Versailles.  Madame 
de  la  Motte  had  preceded  them,  with  her  waiting-woman.  Rosalie 
Briffaut.  They  alighted  in  the  Place  Dauphine,  at  the  Hotel 
de  la  Belle  Image,  the  habitual  residence  of  the  countess. 

The  two  plotters  feigned  to  go  out  for  a  moment;  then  they 
returned  and  announced  to  Mademoiselle  d'Oliva  that  the  queen 
was  entirely  satisfied,  and  was  awaiting  with  impatience  the 
following  day. 

"What  shall  I  have  to  do  then?"  Mademoiselle  d'Oliva  asked. 

"  You  shall  know  to-morrow,"  Madame  de  la  Motte  replied 
mysteriously. 

The  following  day  was  in  fact  the  day  fixed  for  the  scene 
which  we  have  just  described.  When  evening  came,  they  pro- 
ceeded to  the  toilet  of  the  principal  actress.  Madame  de  la 
Motte  did  not  disdain  to  preside  over  it  in  person.  Aided  by 
her  waiting-woman,  she  attired  Mademoiselle  d'Oliva,  who  had 
become  for  the  moment  the  Baronne  d'Oliva,  in  a  white  chemise 
with  a  pink  lining,  threw  over  her  shoulders  a  white  mantle, 
dressed  her  hair  with  a  Therese,  then  gave  her  a  letter,  and  said, 
"  I  shall  conduct  you  this  evening  to  the  park.  A  very  great 
noble  will  approach  you  ;  you  must  give  him  this  letter  and  this 
rose,  and  say  to  him,  '  You  know  what  this  means.'  This  is  all 
that  you  will  have  to  do." 

The  affair  passed  as  had  been  agreed  upon,  and  as  \ve  have 
related.  The  great  noble,  it  is  superfluous  to  say,  was  no  other 
than  the  Cardinal  de  Rohan.  Agitated  by  the  unexpected  rdle 
she  had  to  play,  Mademoiselle  d'Oliva  forgot  indeed  to  give  him 


THE    PROSPERITY   OF   THE   LA   MOTTES.  3OI 

the  letter.  But  the  cardinal  did  not  need  it;  he  had  received  the 
rose ;  he  had  heard  from  the  mouth  of  her  whom  he  took  to  be 
the  queen  the  words  which  seemed  to  him  the  guarantee  of  his 
pardon.  He  was  not  only  confident  and  credulous,  he  was 
blind.  His  gratitude  to  Madame  de  la  Motte  knew  no  bounds ; 
his  faith  in  her  was  not  to  be  shaken. 

"An  ardent  ambition,"  the  Comte  Beugnot  has  said,  "was  joined  in 
him  with  a  very  tender  affection.  Each  of  these  two  sentiments  exalted 
the  other,  and  the  unfortunate  man  was  possessed  by  a  sort  of  delirium. 
I  have  been  able  to  read  hastily  some  of  the  letters  which  he  then  wrote 
to  Madame  de  la  Motte.  They  were  all  fire.  The  shock,  or  rather  the 
movement,  of  the  two  passions  was  frightful." 

The  time  for  work  was  over.  Madame  de  la  Motte  had  only 
to  reap  the  reward  of  her  labour,  and  she  was  not  in  a  humour  to 
wait  long.  At  the  end  of  August,  a  letter  fabricated  by  Retaux 
asked  the  cardinal  for  the  sum  of  sixty  thousand  livres,  for  some 
persons  in  whom  the  queen  was  interested.  The  prelate  had  no 
instant  of  doubt  or  hesitation.  Every  desire  of  the  queen  was 
a  command  for  him.  The  Baron  de  Planta  carried  the  sum 
named  to  Madame  de  la  Motte,  who,  in  this  case  as  in  all  the 
others,  was  the  intermediary  between  Monsieur  de  Rohan  and 
Marie  Antoinette.  Of  these  sixty  thousand  francs,  four  thousand, 
instead  of  the  fifteen  thousand  promised,  were  given  to  Ma- 
demoiselle d'Oliva,  who  continued  to  understand  nothing  of  the 
part  which  she  had  been  made  to  play,  and  who  after  a  time  was 
completely  set  aside ;  the  rest  went  to  meet  the  expenses  of  the 
household  of  the  La  Mottes. 

Three  months  later,  in  November,  came  a  new  letter,  like  the 
preceding  from  the  hands  of  Retaux,  and  a  new  request,  not  for 
sixty,  but  for  a  hundred  thousand  francs !  As  at  first,  the  car- 
dinal paid  without  counting.  The  hundred  thousand  francs  were 
remitted  by  the  Baron  de  Planta.  As  before,  the  sum  passed  to 
the  account  of  the  La  Mottes,  and  went  to  appease  their  cred- 
itors or  to  support  their  prodigalities. 

Their  household  was  ordered  on  a  magnificent  scale.  They 
hired  three  new  domestics;  they  bought  a  carriage,  horses, 
clocks,  bracelets,  diamonds,  gems  of  all  sorts,  a  magnificent 
service  of  plate.  They  no  longer  borrowed;  they  lent.  And  in 
order  the  better  to  emphasize  their  metamorphosis,  Monsieur 
and  Madame  de  la  Motte  betook  themselves  to  Bar-sur-Aube  in 


302  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

great  style;  such  was  their  hurry  to  reappear  in  all  the  magnifi- 
cence of  their  fortune  before  the  eyes  of  those  who  had  formerly 
known  them  in  their  poverty.  A  van  preceded  them  ;  two  cou- 
riers announced  them ;  a  butler,  with  a  grand  air,  ordered  the 
most  expensive  provisions  for  their  dinner.  After  these  prepa- 
rations, which  excited  the  curiosity  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  vil- 
lage, the  couple  themselves  made  their  entrance  in  an  elegant 
berlin.  A  brother-in-law  of  Monsieur  de  la  Motte,  Monsieur  de 
la  Tour,  whom  an  ill-concealed  antipathy  rendered  more  clear- 
sighted, alone  suspected  the  truth,  and  qualified  his  brother-in- 
law  as  a  fool  and  his  sister-in-law  as  a  rogue. 

However,  the  rumour  of  the  influence  of  Madame  de  la  Motte 
spread  on  all  sides :  it  was  talked  of  at  Paris ;  it  was  talked  of  at 
Versailles.  She  herself,  by  a  clever  reserve,  by  exhibition  of  the 
pretended  royal  letters,  always  written  by  Retaux  on  the  famous 
blue  paper  with  vignettes,  carefully  cultivated  the  report;  and 
the  great  style  which  she  maintained  gave  greater  credence  to  what 
she  said.  It  was  the  deceptive  mirror  which  attracted  the  simple, 
the  trap  in  which  the  fools  were  caught.  The  Cardinal  de  Rohan 
was  not  the  only  one  who  was  taken  in  by  this  artifice ;  and  the 
swindle  of  one  hundred  and  sixty  thousand  francs,  of  which  he 
had  been  the  victim,  was  but  child's  play  beside  the  unheard-of 
stroke  which  chance  put  into  the  hands  of  Madame  de  la  Motte. 

Two  jewellers  to  the  crown,  Boehmer  and  Bassange,  had  set  as 
a  necklace  a  magnificent  collection  of  diamonds,  which  had  been 
gathered  together  at  great  expense  and  after  long  research.  As- 
tonished themselves  at  the  price  that  this  ornament  reached,  and 
despairing  to  sell  it  to  any  one  except  sovereigns,  knowing,  more- 
over, the  taste  which  the  queen  on  frequent  occasions  had  mani- 
fested for  gems,  they  got  the  first  gentleman  of  the  bedchamber 
to  propose  it  to  the  king.  Louis  XVI.,  astonished  at  the  beauty 
of  the  necklace,  and  passionately  fond  of  his  wife,  who  had  just 
presented  him  with  his  first  child,  had  contemplated  offering  this 
exquisite  necklace  as  a  present  to  her  in  her  convalescence.  He 
had  carried  the  case  to  her.  They  were  then  in  the  midst  of  the 
American  war.  The  queen  looked  at  the  gems,  admired  them, 
but  refused  to  accept  them.  "  We  have  greater  need  of  a  vessel 
than  of  this  necklace,"  she  replied  simply. 

Boehmer  was  in  despair.  To  retain  in  his  hands  an  object  of  such 
value,  to  tie  up  a  capital  of  sixteen  hundred  thousand  francs, — 
this  was  the  price  which  the  experts  Doigny  and  Maillard  had 


THE    NECKLACE.  303 


estimated  the  necklace  to  be  worth,  —  was  ruin.  He  proposed  the 
necklace  to  various  sovereigns ;  all  were  frightened  at  the  price. 
He  returned  to  Marie  Antoinette ;  she  refused  as  before.  Re- 
pulsed on  all  sides,  the  jeweller  solicited  an  audience,  and  there, 
as  though  seized  with  delirium,  he  threw  himself  at  the  feet  of  the 
princess,  clasped  his  hands,  and  burst  into  tears.  "  Madame,"  he 
cried,  "  I  am  ruined,  dishonoured,  if  you  will  not  buy  my  necklace. 
I  do  not  wish  to  survive  so  many  misfortunes.  I  shall  depart 
hence,  Madame,  to  go  and  throw  myself  into  the  river."  "  Rise, 
Boehmer,"  the  queen  said  to  him,  severely.  "  I  have  not  ordered 
this  necklace  of  you;  I  have  refused  it.  The  king  wished  to  give 
it  to  me,  and  I  refused  it;  never  speak  to  me  of  it  again.  Try  to 
break  it  up,  and  to  sell  it,  and  don't  drown  yourself.  I  am  very 
angry  with  you  for  having  made  this  scene  in  my  presence,  and 
before  this  infant."  (She  had  her  daughter,  Madame  Royale, 
near  her.)  "Never  let  anything  like  this  happen  again.  Go." 
Boehmer  withdrew,  broken-hearted,  and  for  a  certain  time  no  one 
saw  anything  more  of  him. 

In  the  month  of  December,  1784,  the  partner  of  Boehmer,  Bas- 
sange,  heard  one  of  his  friends,  named  Achet,  talk  of  the  favour 
of  Madame  de  la  Motte.  It  was  a  last  resource;  he  thought  to 
profit  by  it  At  his  request  Achet  sought  the  countess,  and 
begged  her  to  use  her  influence  to  persuade  the  queen  to  buy  an 
ornament  which  was  "only  suitable  to  her.  The  adventuress  replied 
in  an  evasive  manner,  but  expressed  the  desire  to  see  the  object  of 
the  negotiation.  The  jeweller  hastened  to  grant  the  wish  of  a  per- 
son so  well  received  at  court,  and  on  December  29  Bassange  and 
Achet  carried  the  necklace  to  Madame  de  la  Motte.  The  latter 
looked  at  the  diamonds,  admired  them,  and  without  giving  any 
positive  assurances,  nevertheless  allowed  them  to  hope. 

Three  weeks  passed  ;  and  the  jewellers  began  to  fear  that  this 
effort  had  also  failed,  when  on  January  21  Madame  de  la  Motte 
announced  to  them  that  the  queen  had  determined  to  purchase 
the  necklace,  but  that  not  wishing  to  negotiate  the  acquisition 
directly,  she  had  charged  a  great  noble,  who  enjoyed  her  confi- 
dence, to  do  so.  Three  days  later,  the  count  and  countess  came 
in  search  of  Bassange  at  seven  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and  said 
to  him  that  the  great  noble  in  question  would  soon  appear. 
A  quarter  of  an  hour  later,  in  fact,  the  negotiator,  who  had  been 
announced,  appeared.  It  was,  as  we  may  imagine,  the  Cardinal 
de  Rohan.  He  examined  the  necklace  in  detail,  asked  the  price 


304  LIFE  OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

of  it,  then  withdrew,  declaring  that  he  would  give  an  account 
of  the  conversation  which  he  had  just  had  to  the  person  who  had 
sent  him ;  that  he  did  not  know  if  he  would  be  permitted  to  men- 
tion her,  but  that  in  any  case  he  hoped  the  jewellers  would 
accept  her  conditions. 

He  made  these  conditions  known  on  January  29:  the  price  of 
the  necklace  was  fixed  at  sixteen  hundred  thousand  francs  ;  the 
payments  should  be  made  in  four  instalments,  six  months  apart; 
the  first  should  fall  due  on  August  I.  The  delivery  of  the  jewels 
should  be  made  on  Tuesday,  February  I  ;  the  purchaser  should 
remain  unknown,  and  exacted  the  greatest  secrecy  in  the  whole 
affair.  Boehmer  and  Bassange  accepted  these  terms,  and  placed 
their  signature  at  the  bottom  of  the  treaty,  which  was  entirely  in 
the  handwriting  of  the  Prince  de  Rohan. 

On  the  ist  of  February,  early  in  the  morning,  they  betook 
themselves  to  the  H6tel  de  Strasburg,  in  the  Rue  Vieille  du 
Temple.  The  cardinal  acknowledged  to  them  then  that  the  pur- 
chaser of  this  precious  ornament  was  no  other  than  the  queen, 
and  showed  them  the  act  of  acquisition  signed  with  the  appro- 
bation of  that  princess.  Each  article  bore  the  word  "  Approved ; " 
and  beneath  the  last  line  was  traced  the  signature,  "  Marie  An- 
toinette of  France."  At  the  same  time  the  cardinal  showed  to 
the  happy  merchants  a  pretended  letter  from  the  queen,  which 
he  folded  over  so  that  only  these  words  could  be  seen :  "  I  am 
not  in  the  habit  of  treating  with  my  jewellers  in  this  manner;  you 
will  keep  this  paper,  and  arrange  everything  as  you  think  best." 

Letter,  approbation,  and  signature  were  fabricated  by  Retaux. 
But  the  jewellers  did  not  know  the  handwriting  of  the  queen,  who 
had  never  given  them  any  orders  except  verbally,  or  through 
the  intermediation  of  one  of  her  women.  Better  versed  in  com- 
mercial customs  than  in  the  royal  signature,  they  did  not  reflect 
that  the  words  "  Marie  Antoinette  of  France  "  were  improbable ; 
they  withdrew  convinced  —  and  who  would  not  have  been  in 
their  place?  — that  the  purchaser  of  the  necklace  was  indeed  the 
brilliant  sovereign,  whose  taste  for  gems  they  knew. 

That  very  evening,  the  cardinal  set  out  for  Versailles.  Fol- 
lowed by  a  footman,  Schreiber,  who  carried  the  precious  case,  he 
went  directly  to  Madame  de  la  Motte  at  the  H6tel  de  la  Belle 
Image.  He  had  hardly  arrived  before  a  man  entered  bearing  a 
letter.  Madame  de  la  Motte  took  it,  broke  it  open,  read  it,  and 
said  to  him  aloud  that  it  was  a  note  from  the  queen,  and  that  the 


THE   CARDINAL'S    CREDULITY.  305 

bearer  was  a  lackey  of  the  chamber,  named  Desclaux.  A  few 
moments  after,  this  man  re-entered.  Monsieur  de  Rohan  had 
only  time  to  hide  behind  an  alcove,  whose  door  was  half  open, 
and  from  there  he  saw  Madame  de  la  Motte  give  the  necklace 
to  the  pretended  lackey,  who  was  no  other  than  Retaux.  The 
cardinal  recognized  him  positively  for  the  man  who  had  assisted 
in  the  preceding  year  at  the  scene  in  the  avenue. 

On  the  following  day,  February  2,  which  was  a  festival,  Bas- 
sange  was  in  the  gallery  at  Versailles,  and  placed  himself  where 
he  should  see  the  royal  family,  in  order  to  be  among  the  first 
to  enjoy  the  spectacle  of  his  famous  diamonds,  whose  thousand 
lights  would  undoubtedly  sparkle  upon  the  neck  of  the  queen,  as 
she  passed  on  her  way  to  the  chapel.  The  Prince  de  Rohan  was 
also  on  the  watch.  Complete  deception ;  the  queen  passed ;  she 
had  on  only  her  ordinary  jewels.  Bassange  was  astonished ;  but 
the  cardinal,  although  surprised  himself,  reassured  him  by  saying 
that  the  queen  undoubtedly  did  not  wish  to  wear  her  necklace 
before  having  apprised  the  king  of  her  acquisition,  and  that  she 
had  not  had  time  to  inform  him.  Days  passed;  months  passed; 
occasions  for  full  dress  occurred ;  and  the  queen  persisted  in  not 
wearing  her  new  ornament.  She  went  to  Paris  after  the  birth  of 
the  Due  de  Normandie.  On  that  solemn  occasion,  no  necklace. 
Pentecost  came ;  still  nothing.  She  saw  the  cardinal,  and  always 
treated  him  with  the  same  disdain.  A  strange  mystery !  What 
was  the  meaning  of  such  caprice? 

Was  not  this  extraordinary  obstinacy  likely  to  open  the  eyes 
of  the  blind  prelate?  Not  yet;  Madame  de  la  Motte  was  there  to 
ward  off  the  danger.  In  order  to  counteract  the  effects  of  this 
coldness,  which  might  alarm  and  enlighten  her  dupe,  she  took 
care  to  transmit  to  him  more  frequently  than  ever  the  famous 
notes  on  blue  paper  with  vignettes,  which,  by  their  protestations 
of  secret  sympathy,  calmed  his  distrust.  In  order  the  better  to 
maintain  his  illusions,  she  pretended  to  borrow  a  few  louis  from 
him ;  and  when  he  came  to  see  her  in  the  Rue  Neuve  St.  Gilles, 
she  received  him  in  a  small,  ill-furnished  room,  which  was  very 
high  up.  How  should  the  cardinal,  reassured  on  the  score  of 
the  queen  by  these  forged  letters,  and  on  that  of  Madame  de  la 
Motte  by  her  evident  distress,  grow  suspicious?  During  this 
time  the  necklace  was  taken  to  pieces.  Retaux  at  Paris,  Mon- 
sieur de  la  Motte  in  London,  sold  the  parts  of  it;  and  the  count, 
on  his  return  from  England  on  June  3,  presented  to  the  banker 
VOL.  i.  —  20 


306  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Perregaux  letters  of  credit  for  one  hundred  and  twenty  thousand 
francs,  which  served  to  support  the  luxury  of  the  houses  at  Paris 
and  at  Bar-sur-Aube. 

However,  the  term  of  the  first  payment  was  approaching;  the 
fraud  would  be  discovered.  It  was  necessary  for  Madame  de  la 
Motte  to  gain  time.  Retaux  forged  a  new  letter.  The  queen 
wrote  to  the  cardinal  that  she  found  the  necklace  decidedly  too 
dear;  that  she  demanded  a  reduction  of  two  hundred  thousand 
francs  on  the  price;  and  that  instead  of  paying,  on  August  I,  four 
hundred  thousand  francs,  she  should  pay  seven  hundred  thousand. 
The  prelate  went  to  the  jewellers  to  inform  them  of  the  new 
desires  of  their  august  client.  The  two  partners  at  first  made 
some  difficulties,  then  they  yielded,  and  on  the  advice  of  Mon- 
sieur de  Rohan,  wrote  Marie  Antoinette  the  following  letter:  — 

MADAME,  —  We  are  overwhelmed  with  happiness  to  dare  to  think  that 
the  last  arrangements  which  have  been  proposed  to  us,  and  to  which  we 
have  submitted  with  zeal  and  respect,  are  a  new  proof  of  our  submission 
and  devotion  to  the  orders  of  your  Majesty ;  and  it  gives  us  great  satisfac- 
tion to  think  that  the  most  beautiful  parure  of  diamonds  that  exists  will  be 
worn  by  the  greatest  and  best  of  queens. 

On  July  12  Boehmer  went  to  Versailles ;  he  was  to  take  the 
bow,  the  buckle,  and  the  sword  destined  for  the  young  Due 
d'Angouleme  on  the  occasion  of  his  baptism.  On  presenting 
these  objects  to  the  queen,  on  her  return  from  mass,  he  gave  her 
at  the  same  time  the  letter  which  we  have  just  quoted.  Marie 
Antoinette  read  the  letter,  understood  nothing  of  it,  and  burned 
it.  It  was  the  more  impossible  for  her  to  divine  the  sense  of  that 
enigmatical  language  as  some  time  before  the  jeweller,  on  being 
questioned  by  Madame  Campan  concerning  the  fate  of  the 
famous  necklace,  had  declared  that  he  had  sold  it  at  Constanti- 
nople to  the  favourite  sultana.  A  few  days  after,  however,  the 
Baron  de  Breteuil,  minister  of  the  household  of  the  king,  sent 
for  Boehmer,  and  asked  him  what  his  incomprehensible  note  of 
July  12  had  meant.  Faithful  to  his  system  of  mystery,  and 
obedient  to  the  instructions  of  the  cardinal,  Boehmer  contented 
himself  with  replying  that  there  was  question  of  certain  jewels 
which  he  desired  to  sell  to  the  queen.  In  face  of  these  strange 
evasions  and  careful  reticences,  how  could  Marie  Antoinette 
imagine  that  there  was  anything  serious?  She  believed  that  the 
mind  of  her  jeweller  was  affected  by  the  anguish  which  the  neces- 


BOEHMER   APPEALS    TO   MADAME   CAMPAN.          307 

sity  of  destroying  his  necklace  had  caused  him ;  she  regarded 
him  as  a  monomaniac,  whose  folly  was  not  dangerous,  and 
merited  rather  pity  than  anger. 

The  moment  arrived,  however,  when  everything  was  to  be  dis- 
covered. At  the  end  of  July  Madame  de  la  Motte  produced  a 
note  wherein  the  queen  avowed  that  she  could  not  pay  before 
October  I.  The  cardinal  received  it  with  consternation  ;  he  be- 
gan to  have  suspicions  of  the  authenticity  of  the  letters;  yet 
either  from  pride,  or  because  of  his  passion  for  Madame  de  la 
Motte,  whom  he  did  not  wish  to  ruin,  he  refused  to  investigate 
the  affair.  The  adventuress,  in  order  to  re-establish  a  credit  which 
she  felt  was  trembling,  hastened  to  give  him  a  sum  of  thirty 
thousand  francs  as  an  indemnity  to  the  jeweller  for  the  delay 
in  the  payment.  The  distrust  of  the  cardinal  could  not  with- 
stand a  payment  of  thirty  thousand  francs ;  he  gave  the  sum 
to  Boehmer  on  the  3Oth  of  July,  and  doubted  no  more.  But  it 
was  the  merchants  who  became  alarmed  in  their  turn  at  so  many 
delays  and  mysteries,  at  the  silence  of  the  queen,  and  the  pressure 
of  their  creditors;  and  this  disquietude  was  changed  to  despair 
when  on  August  2  or  3,  Madame  de  la  Motte  declared  to  them 
impudently  that  the  sale  which  they  had  concluded  was  not 
legal,  and  that  the  signature  of  Marie  Antoinette  was  false. 
"However,"  she  added,  "the  cardinal  is  rich;  you  can  hold 
him  responsible." 

Bassange  ran  to  the  Hotel  de  Strasburg.  Monsieur  de  Rohan, 
who  was  beginning  to  understand,  but  who  did  not  wish  to  avow 
it,  and  was  desirous  before  everything  of  hushing  up  a  transaction 
which  was  so  humiliating  to  his  vanity,  affirmed  on  oath  the  authen- 
ticity of  the  sale.  On  the  following  day  Madame  de  la  Motte, 
who  wished  to  compromise  him  still  more,  arrived  at  his  house 
very  much  agitated,  pretending  that  she  was  a  victim  to  a  court 
intrigue,  a  prey  to  the  persecutions  of  the  police ;  and  the  car- 
dinal, who  could  not  resist  the  strange  influence  of  the  adven- 
turess, consented  to  give  her  an  asylum  in  his  house,  together 
with  her  husband  and  her  waiting-woman. 

In  the  mean  while  Bassange's  partner,  Boehmer,  who  was  but 
half  reassured,  went  to  Crespy  to  see  the  chief  waiting-woman, 
Madame  Campan,  whom  he  knew,  and  asked  her  if  the  queen  had 
not  charged  her  with  some  commission  for  him.  On  her  response 
in  the  negative,  "  But,"  said  he,  "  to  whom  must  I  address  myself 
to  obtain  the  reply  to  the  letter  which  I  gave  her?"  "To  no 


308  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

one.  Her  Majesty  burned  your  letter,  and  did  not  even  under- 
stand what  you  meant."  "But,  Madame,  that  is  impossible;  the 
queen  knows  very  well  that  she  has  some  money  to  give  me." 
"  Some  money,  Monsieur  Boehmer !  it  is  a  long  time  since  we  set- 
tled your  last  account  with  the  queen."  "  Ah,  Madame,  you  are 
very  much  mistaken  ;  a  very  large  sum  is  owing  to  me."  "  What 
do  you  mean?"  "It  is  necessary  to  tell  you  everything.  The 
queen  has  kept  a  secret  from  you  ;  she  has  bought  my  great  neck- 
lace." "The  queen?  she  refused  it;  she  refused  it  when  the  king 
wished  to  give  it  to  her."  "  She  changed  her  mind."  "  At  what 
time  did  the  queen  announce  to  you  that  she  had  decided  on 
the  acquisition  of  your  necklace?  "  "  She  never  spoke  to  me  her- 
self on  the  subject/'  "  Who,  then,  was  her  intermediary  ?  "  "  The 
Cardinal  de  Rohan."  "  The  Cardinal  de  Rohan  !  "  Madame  Cam- 
pan  exclaimed,  stupefied  ;  "  but  the  queen  has  not  spoken  to  him 
since  his  return  from  Vienna.  There  is  no  man  at  the  court  in 
greater  disfavour.  You  have  been  robbed,  my  poor  Boehmer." 
"  The  queen  pretends  to  be  on  ill  terms  with  his  Eminence,  but 
he  is  in  reality  in  favour  with  her."  "  But  how  were  the  orders  of 
her  Majesty  transmitted  to  you?"  "In  writing,  signed  by  her 
hand,  which  I  have  been  forced  to  show  to  people  from  whom  I 
have  borrowed  money  for  some  time,  without,  however,  succeed- 
ing in  calming  them."  "  Ah,  what  an  odious  intrigue  !  "  Madame 
Campan  cried,  more  and  more  stupefied,  and  not  knowing  whether 
she  had  to  do  with  a  fool  or  a  scamp  ;  but  feeling  that  there  were 
some  infernal  machinations  to  be  discovered,  she  urged  Boehmer 
to  go  immediately  to" Versailles  and  inform  the  Baron  de  Breteuil. 
But  Boehmer,  who  was  probably  not  anxious  to  avow  to  the  min- 
ister that  he  had  lied,  instead  of  going  to  him,  went  to  Trianon, 
and  solicited  an  audience  with  the  queen.  The  latter,  who  was 
tired  of  his  importunities,  refused  to  see  him.  "  He  is  mad,"  she 
replied  ;  "  I  do  not  wish  to  see  him." 

A  few  days  after,  Madame  Campan  returned  from  Crespy ;  the 
queen  sent  for  her  to  go  over  her  role  of  Rosine  with  her,  which 
she  was  to  play  in  "  The  Barber  of  Seville."  "  Did  you  know,"  she 
said  to  her,  "  that  that  imbecile  of  a  Boehmer  came  here  and  asked 
to  speak  to  me  ?  I  refused  to  receive  him.  What  did  he  want  of 
me,  do  you  know?  "  Thus  placed  in  a  position  to  explain,  Madame 
Campan  related  her  whole  conversation  with  Boehmer,  and  the 
strange  revelations  which  he  had  made.  Full  of  surprise  and  in- 
dignation, Marie  Antoinette  sent  for  the  jeweller;  he  came  on 


THE    DISCOVERY.  309 


August  Q,  insisted  upon  being  paid,  and,  pressed  with  questions, 
ended  by  avowing  what  had  occurred,  or  at  least  what  he  sup- 
posed. The  queen  listened  with  growing  astonishment  and  con- 
centrated rage ;  she  did  not  know  what  to  think  of  so  much  folly 
or  so  much  infamy. 

But  before  taking  any  resolution,  she  wished  to  investigate  the 
affair;  and  being  unable  to  distinguish  the  truth  in  the  incoherent 
declarations  of  the  jeweller,  she  demanded  a  written  explanation, 
which  was  given  to  her  on  August  12. 

"  On  Boehmer's  departure,"  Madame  Caropan  has  written,  "  I  found 
her  in  an  alarming  state.  The  idea  that  any  one  could  believe  that  such  a 
man  as  the  cardinal  had  her  confidence  ;  that  she  had  made  use  of  him  in 
dealing  with  a  merchant  to  procure  for  her,  unknown  to  the  king,  a  thing 
which  she  had  refused  from  the  king  himself,  —  threw  her  into  despair." 

But  she  did  not  contemplate  for  an  instant  hushing  up  the  affair. 
Strong  in  the  testimony  of  her  conscience,  and  yielding  to  the  exi- 
gency of  her  just  indignation,  she  wished  that  the  odious  intrigue 
should  be  thoroughly  investigated.  "  It  is  necessary,"  she  said, 
"  that  these  hideous  vices  should  be  unmasked ;  when  the  Roman 
purple  and  the  title  of  a  prince  only  hide  a  needy  person  or  a 
scamp,  who  dares  to  compromise  the  wife  of  his  sovereign,  all 
France,  all  Europe,  must  know  it."  Was  this  resolution  spontane- 
ous in  her?  Was  it  due,  as  Madame  Campan  insinuates,  to  the 
influence  of  the  Abbe  de  Vermond,  and  to  the  Baron  de  Bre- 
teuil,  inveterate  enemies  of  the  bishop  of  Strasburg,  and  who  were 
only  too  desirous  of  a  scandal  to  ruin  him?  In  this  supposition 
the  first  waiting-woman  was  wrong.  The  queen  consulted  no  one 
but  her  husband.  The  king  came  to  spend  Sunday,  the  I4th,  at 
Trianon ;  and  it  was  with  him  alone  that  the  queen,  enlightened 
by  the  revelations  of  Boehmer,  and  by  the  memorial  which  the 
jewellers  had  sent  her  on  August  12,  determined  upon  her  con- 
duct and  the  measures  it  was  necessary  to  take.  She  thus  in- 
forms Joseph  II.  of  the  iniquitous  affair  in  a  letter  written  on 
August  22 :  "  Everything  has  been  concerted  between  the  king  and 
me ;  the  ministers  knew  nothing  of  it  until  the  moment  when  the 
king  sent  for  the  cardinal,  and  interrogated  him  in  the  presence 
of  the  keeper  of  the  seals  and  the  Baron  de  Breteuil." 

However  this  may  be,  it  is  certain  that  after  an  attentive  study 
of  the  facts  then  known,  and  of  the  documents  which  they  had  in 
their  hands,  the  king  and  queen  were  forced  to  believe  in  the  cul- 


310  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

pability  of  the  cardinal.  His  mad  prodigalities,  his  immense 
debts,  despite  his  immense  revenues,  his  bad  reputation,  the  dis- 
content which  he  had  aroused  in  his  own  diocese,  where  the 
people  accused  him  of  spending  on  entertainments,  on  gallan- 
tries, on  useless  and  magnificent  embellishments  of  his  chateau 
of  Saverne,  his  income  of  eight  hundred  thousand  francs,  —  every- 
thing seemed  to  inculpate  him.  In  their  verbal  account,  as  well 
as  in  their  memorial,  the  jewellers  only  named  and  incriminated 
him ;  at  three  different  times,  and  again  in  the  month  of  March, 
Parliament  had  accused  him  of  waste  in  the  administration  of  the 
Hospital  of  the  Quinze-Vingts,  of  which  he  was  superior-general. 
However  monstrous  it  might  seem,  in  the  face  of  this  united 
evidence,  one  was  led,  as  the  king  said  and  the  queen  wrote,  to 
believe  that,  pressed  by  his  need  for  money,  he  had  sought  to 
procure  it  by  appropriating  the  necklace,  in  the  belief  that  he 
would  be  able  to  pay  the  jewellers  at  the  time  stated,  without  any- 
thing being  discovered.  One  was  obliged  to  look  upon  him  as  a 
scamp  ;  for  as  yet  nothing  warranted  one's  thinking  him  a  dupe. 

On  Monday,  August  15,  at  noon,  the  grand  almoner,  dressed  in 
his  pontifical  robes,  was  on  his  way  to  the  chapel,  when  Chanlau, 
head  footman,  informed  him  that  the  king  wished  to  see  him  in  his 
cabinet.  The  queen  was  there  with  the  keeper  of  the  seals  and 
the  Baron  de  Breteuil. 

"  You  have  bought  some  diamonds  from  Boehmer,"  the  king 
said  to  the  cardinal. 

"Yes,  Sire." 

"What  have  you  done  with  them?  " 

"  I  thought  they  had  been  given  to  the  queen." 

"  Who  charged  you  with  the  commission?  " 

"  A  lady  named  the  Comtesse  de  la  Motte-Valois,  who  showed 
me  a  letter  from  the  queen;  and  I  imagined  that  I  was  doing 
something  that  would  be  agreeable  to  her  Majesty  in  undertaking 
the  negotiation." 

The  queen  interrupted  him  hastily. 

"  How  could  you  believe,  Monsieur,  —  you  to  whom  I  have  not 
spoken  for  eight  years,  —  that  I  should  choose  you  to  under- 
take such  a  negotiation,  and  through  the  intervention  of  such  a 
woman?" 

"  I  see  clearly,"  the  cardinal  replied,  "  that  I  have  been  cruelly 
deceived;  I  will  pay  for  the  necklace.  The  desire  which  I  had 
to  please  your  Majesty  closed  my  eyes.  I  suspected  no  fraud, 
and  I  am  sorry." 


THE   ARREST   OF   THE    CARDINAL.  311 

Then  lie  drew  from  his  pocket  a  case,  and  took  out  the  letter 
which  he  had  supposed  had  been  written  by  the  queen  to  Madame 
de  la  Motte,  giving  him  this  commission.  The  king  took  it,  and 
showing  it  to  the  cardinal,  he  said,  — 

"  This  is  neither  the  handwriting  of  the  queen  nor  her  signa- 
ture. How  could  a  prince  of  the  House  of  Rohan,  how  could 
a  grand  almoner,  imagine  that  the  queen  could  sign  herself 
'  Marie  Antoinette  of  France '  ?  Every  one  knows  that  queens 
only  sign  their  baptismal  names." 

The  cardinal  stammered.     The  king  continued,  — 

"  Explain  to  me  this  enigma.  I  do  not  wish  to  find  you 
guilty;  I  desire  your  justification." 

More  and  more  disturbed,  the  cardinal  turned  pale,  and 
supported  himself  against  the  table. 

"  Control  yourself,  Monsieur  le  Cardinal,  and  go  into  my 
cabinet;  you  will  there  find  paper,  pens,  and  ink;  write  what 
you  have  to  say  to  me." 

The  cardinal  passed  into  the  cabinet,  and  returned  at  the  end 
of  a  quarter  of  an  hour  with  a  writing  as  little  clear  as  his 
verbal  responses  had  been.  The  king,  convinced  of  his  culpabil- 
ity by  his  very  embarrassment,  said  to  him  hotly,  "  Retire,  Mon- 
sieur !  "  and  an  order  was  given  to  arrest  him.  Neither  the 
representations  of  certain  ministers,  nor  the  supplications  of  the 
prelate,  who  begged  for  grace,  could  change  the  determination 
of  Louis  XVI.,  or  persuade  him  to  allow  the  accused  to  remain 
at  liberty.  "  I  cannot,"  he  said,  "  consent  thereto,  either  as  king 
or  husband." 

"  We  must  put  an  end  to  it,"  he  wrote  to  Vergennes,  who  had  urged 
him  to  hush  up  the  affair,  —  "  we  must  put  an  end  to  the  intrigues  of  a 
rascal  who  has  so  scandalously  compromised  the  queen,  and  who,  to  justify 
himself,  has  nothing  to  allege  but  his  intimacy  with  an  adventuress  of  the 
lowest  class.  He  dishonours  his  ecclesiastical  character.  Though  he  has 
become  cardinal,  he  is  no  less  a  subject  of  my  crown." 

As  for  the  queen,  she  desired  a  public  reparation.  "  I  am 
anxious,"  she  wrote  to  Joseph  II.,  "  that  this  scandal,  with  all 
its  details,  should  be  thoroughly  cleared  up  in  the  eyes  of  the 
world." 

The  cardinal  left  the  royal  chamber  with  the  Baron  de  Breteuil. 
A  young  lieutenant  of  the  guards,  Monsieur  de  la  Jouffroy, 
was  there.  "  Monsieur,"  the  baron  said  to  him,  "  the  king  com- 


312  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

mands  you  not  to  leave  Monsieur  le  Cardinal,  and  to  conduct 
him  to  your  house.  You  will  be  responsible  for  his  person, 
Monsieur." 

Agitated  at  so  unexpected  an  occurrence,  afraid  of  his  respon- 
sibility, fearful,  perhaps,  for  himself,  for  he  was  overwhelmed 
with  debts,  the  young  man  lost  his  head,  and  neglected  the  most 
ordinary  precautions :  he  permitted  his  prisoner  to  write  a  word 
in  pencil.  This  word,  given  to  the  cardinal's  heiduqite,  was 
immediately  carried  to  Paris ;  and  while  the  major  of  the  body- 
guard, Monsieur  d'Agoult,  conducted  Monsieur  de  Rohan  first  to 
the  Hotel  de  Strasburg,  then  to  the  Bastille,  —  where  he  enjoyed 
in  the  beginning  the  greatest  liberty,  holding  his  court  as  in  his 
hdtel,  and  continuing,  if  not  to  exercise  his  great  functions,  at 
least  to  use  the  powers  of  his  great  office,  —  the  Abbe  Georgel, 
warned  by  the  note,  hastened  to  destroy  the  letters  of  Madame 
de  la  Motte,  and  everything  that  might  compromise  his  master. 
When  the  Baron  de  Breteuil  arrived  to  put  the  seals  on  the  car- 
dinal's papers,  it  was  too  late;  and  when,  on  the  I7th,  the  seals 
were  removed  in  the  presence  of  all  the  ministers,  with  the 
exception  of  the  Marechal  de  Segur,  nothing  was  found. 

Three  days  after  this  occurrence,  on  August  18,  at  four  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  Madame  de  la  Motte  was  arrested  at  Bar-sur- 
Aube,  as  she  was  returning  from  an  entertainment  of  the  Due 
de  Penthievre  at  Chateau-Villain,  where  she  had  displayed  all 
the  splendours  of  her  new  fortune.  Two  months  afterward, 
Mademoiselle  d'Oliva  was  captured  at  Brussels,  and  in  the  fol- 
lowing spring,  Quidor,  the  agent  of  police,  discovered  Retaux 
de  Villette  at  Geneva,  where  he  was  in  hiding  under  an  assumed 
name.  Monsieur  de  la  Motte  succeeded  in  escaping  to  England. 

Louis  XVI.  had  given  to  the  cardinal  the  choice  of  acknowl- 
edging his  fault  and  appealing  to  the  clemency  of  his  sovereign, 
or  of  being  tried  by  Parliament.  The  cardinal  chose  the  latter; 
and  on  September  5  the  king,  filled  with  indignation,  he  said, 
"  that  any  one  should  have  dared  to  use  so  august  a  name  and 
one  that  was  dear  to  us  for  so  many  reasons,  and  violate  with 
such  unheard-of  temerity  the  respect  due  to  the  royal  majesty," 
acquainted  Parliament  by  letters-patent  with  the  affair. 

One  can  easily  imagine  the  scandal  that  a  trial  begun  under 
such  conditions  created.  A  Rohan,  grand  almoner  of  France, 
arrested  in  the  palace  like  any  vulgar  malefactor !  A  cardinal 
dragged  before  a  secular  tribunal !  The  stupefaction  was  great, 


THE    PARTISANS   OF   THE   CARDINAL.  313 

and  the  displeasure  not  less.  In  Parliament,  even  before  the 
case  was  opened,  President  de  Corberon,  at  the  instigation  of 
D'Epremenil,  made  a  violent  attack  upon  what  he  called  the  rape 
of  the  cardinal ;  and  all  the  authority  of  President  d'Ormesson 
was  necessary  to  adjourn  the  discussion  of  this  burning  question. 
At  Versailles  the  court  was  enraged ;  the  noblesse  were  indignant 
at  the  outrage  to  one  of  their  order;  the  clergy  complained  of 
the  imprisonment  of  a  prince  of  the  Church.  They  called  a 
General  Assembly  on  the  day  following  the  registration  of  the 
letters-patent,  to  protest  against  these  letters,  and  to  demand 
ecclesiastical  judges.  Would  not  the  bishop  of  Mayence,  who 
was  the  metropolitan  of  the  bishop  of  Strasburg,  take  up  the 
affair?  And  would  the  emperor  tolerate  the  violation  of  the 
privileges  of  a  prince  of  the  Empire?  These  questions  were 
asked  in  public ;  and  people  said  to  one  another,  not  without  a 
secret  content,  that  the  authorities  would  probably  be  obliged  to 
retreat.  The  court  of  Rome  itself  was  aroused,  blamed  the  car- 
dinal for  having  accepted  a  lay  jurisdiction,  and  threatened  him 
with  a  suspension  of  his  honours  and  functions. 

The  clamour  was  general.  One  saw  members  of  the  royal 
family,  like  Mesdames,  loudly  censure  the  conduct  of  their 
nephew  and  niece  for  having  brought  the  shady  transaction  to  the 
light.  Intimates  even  of  the  queen's  set,  if  we  may  believe  Stael, 
—  the  Polignacs,  the  Vaudreuils,  —  took  sides  against  her.  The 
House  of  Conde,  the  Rohans,  the  Soubises,  the  Guemenees,  went 
into  mourning,  and  in  this  costume  placed  themselves  along  the 
passage  of  the  councillors  of  the  great  chamber  when  they  went 
to  the  palace.  Some  princes  of  the  blood  openly  petitioned  in 
favour  of  the  accused.  All  who  were  hostile  to  royalty,  all  the 
malcontents,  all  those  who  were  jealous,  all  the  friends  of  the 
cardinal,  and  all  the  enemies  of  Marie  Antoinette,  all  the  rem- 
nants of  the  old  cabals  of  D'Aiguillon  and  of  Marsan,  —  all  those 
who  were  envious  of  the  grace,  beauty,  power,  or  happiness  of 
their  young  sovereign  united  against  her.  Parliament  itself — 
that  secular  depository  of  the  laws,  that  guardian  of  the  majesty 
and  the  impartiality  of  justice  —  was  not  able  to  preserve,  in  that 
serious  debate,  the  immutable  serenity  of  a  judge ;  it  made 
a  political  question  of  it,  an  instrument  of  opposition.  "That 
great  body,"  Beugnot  said,  "is  beginning  to  lose  self-control." 
It  allowed  itself  in  great  part  to  be  corrupted,  and  one  was  able 
to  lay  before  the  queen  the  list  of  the  members  of  the  great 


314  LIFE   OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

chamber  who  had  been  bribed  by  the  Rohans,  and  the  amount 
of  money  which  had  been  used  to  bribe  them. 

"  The  women,"  Madame  Campan  said,  "  played  a  part  in  this 
affair  which  was  an  outrage  to  morality:  it  was  through  them, 
and  by  reason  of  the  considerable  sums  which  they  had  received, 
that  the  oldest  and  most  respectable  heads  were  seduced."  A 
maitre  des  requites,  who  was  present  at  the  session  when  the 
documents  of  procedure  were  read,  took  note  of  what  was  there 
said,  and  transmitted  to  the  advocates  of  the  accused  a  plan 
of  defence.  And  the  Abbe  Georgel  confessed  that  that  same 
vehement  adversary  of  royalty,  who  was  later  to  defend  it  with 
equal  violence,  and  to  expiate  his  blind  enthusiasm  on  the  scaf- 
fold, D'Eprem£nil,  informed  the  friends  of  the  Rohans  of  all  the 
interesting  particulars  which  might  be  useful  to  them. 

"  I  am  charmed  that  we  have  no  longer  to  talk  of  this  horror," 
the  queen  wrote"  to  her  brother,  shortly  after  the  presentation  of 
the  case  in  Parliament.  The  queen  was  mistaken :  it  was  by  no 
means  finished.  The  public  was  too  agitated  to  keep  silence ; 
and  the  partisans  of  the  cardinal,  above  all,  his  secretary,  neg- 
lected no  means  to  excite  their  emotion.  This  sorry  person  — 
whom  Louis  XVI.,  in  a  moment  of  legitimate  indignation,  had 
wished  to  turn  out-of-doors  at  Versailles,  and  of  whom  he  had 
written  to  Vergennes,  "  He  who  can  lie  once  can  lie  twenty 
times,"  and  whom  Parliament  itself  had  accused  of  forgery  — 
avenged  himself  for  the  just  contempt  of  his  sovereign  by  re- 
doubling his  intrigues  and  outrages  against  his  queen.  Using 
his  privilege  as  vicar-general  of  the  grand  almoner,  he  had 
printed  and  attached  to  the  doors  of  the  sacristies  and  the 
churches  dependent  upon  the  grand  almoner,  even  to  the  door 
of  the  king's  chapel,  a  statement  wherein  he  compared  Mon- 
seigneur  de  Rohan  to  Saint  Paul  in  irons,  and  himself  to  Timothy. 
A  lettre  de  cachet  exiled  him  to  Mortagne.  This  was  the  only 
rigorous  measure  taken  against  his  insulting  effrontery.  One 
has  accused  the  old  monarchy  of  despotism;  if  ever  government 
exhibited  patience,  pushed  even  to  weakness,  it  was  the  govern- 
ment of  Louis  XVI. 

By  one  of  those  inconsistencies  dear  to  the  French,  public 
opinion,  which  had  until  then  been  so  justly  severe  on  the  cardi- 
nal, whom  it  had  declared  to  be  worthy  rather  of  contempt  than 
hatred,  now  gave  him  its  sympathy,  if  not  its  esteem,  at  the  very 
time  when  he  least  merited  it.  It  regarded  him  as  a  victim. 


TRIAL   OF   THE    CARDINAL.  315 

when  it  should  have  regarded  him  as  an  unfortunate  man  and  a 
fool.  But  he  had  compromised  the  name  of  his  queen  in  a  low 
intrigue;  he  had  outraged  her  by  his  insensate  hopes.  This 
was  enough  to  make  him  popular.  A  lady  of  the  court  wittily 
wrote,  "The  cardinal  to-day  has  for  defenders  all  those  who 
have  never  come  in  contact  with  him."  The  dependants  of  the 
House  of  Rohan,  who  were  scattered  everywhere,  sought  to  arouse 
interest  for  the  accused  among  the  middle  class  and  the  popu- 
lace. Even  fashion  took  part ;  the  women  wore  hats  "  au  cardi- 
nal "  at  Longchamps,  and  decked  themselves  with  yellow  and 
red  ribbons,  "  cardinal  on  straw  colour;  "  the  men  carried  snuff- 
boxes of  ivory,  with  a  tiny  black  spot,  "  au  cardinal  blanchi." 
The  following  couplet  was  sung  in  the  streets :  — 

"  Our  Holy  Father  reddened  him  ; 
The  king  and  queen  have  blackened  him ; 
But  Parliament  will  whiten  him. 
Hallelujah ! " 

The  popular  poet  was  not  mistaken ;  he  saw  clearly  into  the  in- 
trigues of  the  enemies  of  the  queen,  and  had  divined  the  issues 
of  the  trial. 

The  investigation  of  this  long  and  shady  affair  lasted  more 
than  nine  months.  Finally,  on  the  nights  of  the  29th  and  3<Dth 
of  May,  1786,  the  prisoner  was  transferred  from  the  Bastille  to 
the  Conciergerie.  On  the  3Oth,  he  appeared  before  Parliament. 
All  the  Rohans  were  ranged  at  the  door  of  the  great  chamber, 
awaiting  the  judges.  As  soon  as  these  appeared,  "  Messieurs," 
the  Comtesse  de  Marsan  said  to  them,  "  you  are  going  to  judge 
us  all."  When  the  cardinal  entered  the  audience-chamber,  he 
was  received  with  the  greatest  honours ;  he  was  permitted  to  sit 
down,  and  the  councillors  saluted  him.  When  he  went  out,  all 
the  judges  rose,  which  was  a  very  great  distinction.  He  was  not 
treated  as  an  accused  person,  but  as  a  prince,  almost  as  a  sover- 
eign. He  sought,  moreover,  to  excuse  himself;  feeling  that  he 
was  in  the  presence  of  judges  already  prepossessed  in  his  favour, 
and  that  it  required  but  little  to  win  them  over  completely,  he 
humbled  himself,  alleged  his  good  faith  and  his  credulity.  "  I 
have  been  completely  blinded,"  he  said,  "  by  the  great  desire  I 
had  to  regain  the  good  graces  of  the  queen."  Madame  de  la 
Motte  was  more  audacious ;  she  denied  everything. 

The  procurator-general,  Joly  de  Fleury,  presented  his  opinion. 


316  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

He  would  require  that  the  cardinal  be  made  to  declare  that  he 
had  acted  boldly  in  permitting  himself  to  believe  in  a  nocturnal 
meeting  on  the  terrace  at  Versailles,  and  in  undertaking,  unknown 
to  the  king  and  queen,  a  negotiation  for  the  purchase  of  the 
necklace;  that  he  should  demand  their  pardon  in  the  presence 
of  the  bench ;  and  finally  that  he  should  be  condemned  to  hand 
in  his  resignation  as  grand  almoner,  and  not  to  approach  any 
place  where  the  royal  family  might  be. 

He  had  hardly  finished,  when,  "  Fie,  then,  Monsieur !  "  cried 
the  Councillor  Seguier,  "  this  opinion  is  that  of  a  minister,  and  not 
that  of  a  procurator-general."  "  This  is  the  opinion  of  a  savage," 
Montgodefroy  exclaimed.  A  violent  tumult  arose  in  the  as- 
sembly ;  opprobrious  names  were  exchanged  among  the  magis- 
trates. The  reporters  of  the  affair,  Titon  de  Villotran  and  Dupuis 
de  Moree,  adopted  the  opinion  of  the  procurator-general,  together 
with  fifteen  councillors,  among  whom  was  Monsieur  d'Amecourt. 
President  d'Ormesson  suggested  a  middle  way:  he  proposed  to 
allow  the  cardinal  to  keep  his  offices  and  dignities,  while  con- 
demning him  to  ask  the  queen's  pardon.  But  the  members 
opposed  to  the  court,  the  Freteaus,  the  Herault  de  Sechelles,  the 
Barillons,  the  Robert  de  Saint- Vincents,  thought  that  the  prelate 
should  be  discharged  of  all  accusation ;  the  latter  even  dared  to 
blame,  without  any  reserve,  the  conduct  of  the  king  and  of  the 
queen,  and  the  public  trial  of  the  grand  almoner.  Parliament, 
which  should  have  set  the  example  of  respect  to  authority,  pub- 
lished its  contempt  for  it.  Despite  the  opinion  of  the  first  presi- 
dent, and  although  the  best  minds  supported  the  opinion  of 
the  procurator-general,  the  opponents  carried  the  day. 

A  chronicler  who  is  above  suspicion  adds,  "  It  is  certain  that 
a  very  strong  cabal  was  necessary  to  obtain  this.  .  .  .  The  more 
one  reflects  on  the  opinion  of  the  procurator-general,  the  wiser 
one  finds  it,  despite  the  fury  of  Monsieur  de  Seguier,  and  the 
cries  of  the  public,  which  was  almost  entirely  composed  of  the 
partisans  of  the  Rohans." 

On  May  31,  at  nine  o'clock  in  the  evening,  after  a  deliberation 
of  eighteen  hours,  sentence  was  pronounced.  With  a  majority  of 
26  against  23,  Madame  de  la  Motte  was  condemned  to  be 
whipped  and  to  be  imprisoned  in  SalpStriere ;  Monsieur  de  la 
Motte  to  the  galleys  for  contumacy;  Retaux  de  Villette  to 
banishment ;  Mademoiselle  d'Oliva  was  not  implicated ;  the  com- 
plaint against  the  cardinal  was  simply  dismissed. 


THE    CARDINAL   IS    BANISHED.  317 

As  soon  as  the  sentence  was  known,  there  was  noisy  applause 
from  the  ten  thousand  persons  who,  since  seven  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  had  filled  the  hall  of  the  Pas-Perdus.  Enthusiastic  accla- 
mations greeted  the  judges  on  their  exit,  as  if  indeed,  as  an  his- 
torian has  justly  said,  there  had  been  question  of  a  great  citizen 
saved  by  courageous  magistrates.  Had  it  not  been  for  an  adroit 
subterfuge  of  Monsieur  de  Launay,  who  led  away  his  prisoner  by 
a  private  passage,  the  people  would  have  unharnessed  the  horses 
of  the  cardinal  and  dragged  his  carriage  to  the  Hotel  de  Soubise. 
When,  on  the  following  day,  the  grand  almoner,  who  was  inno- 
cent of  the  crime  of  swindling,  but  who  was  culpable  in  the  first 
degree  of  tese-majeste,  left  the  Bastille,  it  was  to  the  noise 
of  clapping  of  hands,  and  cries  of  "  Long  live  Monsieur  le  Car- 
dinal !  "  His  hotel  was  illuminated  with  such  a  profusion  of 
lights  that  he  was  embarrassed  at  a  brilliancy  which,  as  Madame 
de  Sabran  wittily  remarked,  showed  his  shame  so  clearly.  The 
fish-women  went  to  congratulate  him ;  and  the  crowd  constrained 
him  to  appear  upon  his  balcony  in  his  invalid  costume,  in  a 
white  cap  and  waistcoat,  for  he  was  suffering.  The  accused 
became  victor.  The  true  criminal  was  the  queen,  or  rather  the 
monarchy ;  when  a  people  have  come  to  the  point  of  showing 
such  disrespect  to  their  princes,  the  hour  of  revolution  will  soon 
sound. 

Justly  more  severe  than  Parliament,  the  king  deprived  the 
cardinal  of  all  his  orders  and  of  all  his  offices,  and  exiled  him  to 
his  abbey  of  Chaise-Dieu,  where  he  was  soon  forgotten  by  his 
friends.  "Congratulate  me;  he  is  gone,"  Madame  de  Marsan 
said.  Somewhat  later  he  received  permission  to  reside  at  Mar- 
moutiers,  where,  on  reflection,  he  was  heard  to  deplore  his  blind- 
ness and  his  mad  expectations.  But  if  Louis  XVI.  might  with 
time  show  a  little  leniency,  on  the  day  following  that  unexpected 
judgment  he  could  only  act  with  rigour.  With  his  loyal  nature 
and  the  high  idea  he  had  of  the  majesty  of  the  throne,  it  was 
impossible  for  him  to  allow  that  the  man  who  had  inflicted  a 
mortal  outrage  on  his  queen,  in  supposing  her  capable  of  meet- 
ing him  at  night,  and  of  buying,  without  the  knowledge  of  her 
husband,  a  necklace  worth  sixteen  hundred  thousand  francs, 
should  go  unpunished.  "  Although  acquitted  of  the  theft  of  the 
necklace,  which  was  the  question  submitted  to  justice,"  Vergennes 
wrote,  "  he,  Rohan,  was  not  acquitted  of  his  imbecile  credulity, 
and  of  having  thought  himself  the  agent  of  the  queen  in  this 


3l8  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

clandestine  bargain."  The  king,  moreover,  did  not  believe  the 
cardinal  as  innocent  of  the  swindle  as  Parliament  had  declared ; 
and  it  must  be  said  that  at  that  epoch  many  persons  shared  this 
opinion.  The  sentence  of  May  31  was,  in  the  eyes  of  the  honest 
monarch,  the  work  of  party  prejudice.  "  They  only  saw  in  the 
affair  a  prince  de  Rohan,  and  a  prince  of  the  Church,"  he  said, 
"  while  he  was  nothing  but  a  man  pressed  for  money,  and  only- 
used  his  position  to  dig  a  ditch  in  which  Monsieur  le  Cardinal 
was  precipitated  in  his  own  turn.  Nothing  is  easier  to  see,  and 
one  need  not  be  an  Alexander  to  cut  this  Gordian  knot." 

As  for  the  queen,  she  was  indignant  at  the  issue  of  the  trial, 
which  was  so  insulting  for  her. 

"Condole  with  me,"  she  said  to  Madame  Campan.  "The  in- 
triguer, who  wished  to  ruin  me  or  to  procure  money  for  himself 
by  using  my  name  and  forging  my  signature,  has  just  been  fully 
acquitted;  but,"  she  added  vehemently,  "as  a  Frenchwoman, 
allow  me  to  condole  with  you.  A  people  is  indeed  unhappy  to 
have  for  its  supreme  tribunal  a  rabble  of  men  who  only  consult 
their  passions,  and  of  whom  some  are  susceptible  of  corruption, 
and  others  of  an  audacity  which  they  have  always  manifested  in 
the  face  of  authority,  and  which  they  have  just  exhibited  in  the 
most  striking  manner  against  those  who  are  clothed  with  it." 
The  sound  of  her  voice,  her  shrill  tone,  her  broken  speech,  the 
bitterness  of  her  gesture,  the  irony  of  her  language,  the  contor- 
tion of  her  features,  the  compression  of  her  lips,  —  everything  in 
her  appearance  bespoke  the  depth  of  a  wound  which  nothing 
could  heal.  A  very  natural  grief !  A  very  just  indignation  !  It 
was  the  first  time  that  the  queen  had  boldly  made  an  appeal  to 
justice,  and  had  courageously  courted  publicity.  Justice  had 
replied  by  an  insult,  publicity  by  calumny. 

And  yet  can  we  regret  this  publicity?  We  think  not.  If  the 
affair  had  been  suppressed,  as  Monsieur  de  Vergennes  desired, 
the  consequences,  as  far  as  public  feeling  was  concerned,  would 
have  been  almost  the  same.  The  time  was  passed  when  a  lettre 
de  cachet  could  hide  forever  a  prisoner  in  the  Bastille  without 
public  cognizance  of  his  name.  A  grand  almoner  of  France 
could  not  have  been  exiled  without  public  knowledge  of  it  and 
inquiry  as  to  the  cause  of  the  sudden  punishment.  Whatever 
precautions  might  have  been  taken,  something  would  always 
have  transpired,  and  that  something,  exaggerated,  commented 
on,  carried  by  the  thousand  voices  of  rumour,  would  have  become 


HER   INNOCENCE   ESTABLISHED.  319 

a  new  calumny,  which,  in  the  absence  of  authentic  documents,  it 
would  have  been  forever  impossible  to  refute. 

To-day  we  know  at  least,  thanks  to  the  documents  of  the  trial, 
the  facts  of  this  shady  affair.  The  intrigue  is  unmasked  in  all 
its  details ;  we  know  who  were  the  criminals,  the  dupes,  the  ac- 
complices, and  the  victims.  The  absolute  innocence  of  the  queen 
has  been  proved  by  the  clearest  evidence;  and  if  her  contem- 
poraries, ill-disposed  and  angry,  sought  to  find  a  new  weapon 
against  her  honour  in  that  odious  intrigue,  posterity,  more  en- 
lightened and  just,  has  loudly  proclaimed  that  everything  was 
done  without  her  knowledge  and  against  her  desires. 


CHAPTER    XXI. 

LAST  DAYS  OF  HAPPINESS. —JOURNEY  TO  CHERBOURG.  —  THE  COURT  AT 
FONTAINEBLEAU  IN  1786.  —  THE  GOODNESS  OF  THE  QUEEN. —  MARIE 
ANTOINETTE  AND  HER  CHILDREN. — THE  SONS  OF  THE  MARQUISE 
DE  BOMBELLES  AND  OF  THE  MARQUISE  DE  SABRAN.  —  DAYS  OF 
SORROW.  —  SCENES  AT  TRIANON  DESCRIBED  BY  MADAME  CAMPAN. 

—  CALUMNY.  —  PAMPHLETS  AND  SONGS.  —  VISIT  OF  THE  ARCHDUKE 
FERDINAND,  AND  OF  THE   DUCHESS  OF   SAXE-TESCHEN.  —  ACQUISI- 
TION OF  ST.  CLOUD.  —  "MADAME  DEFICIT."  —  CALONNE  AND  THE 
QUEEN.  —  REPRESENTATION  OF  "  ATHALIE."  —  THE  PORTRAIT  OF  THE 
QUEEN  is  NOT  EXHIBITED.  —  ESTRANGEMENT  FROM  THE  POLIGNACS. 

—  THE  DEATH  OF  SOPHIE  BEATRIX. 

THREE  weeks  after  the  end  of  the  trial,  Louis  XVI.  set  out 
for  Normandy.  He  was  to  visit  the  immense  works  which, 
under  the  direction  of  Dumouriez,  were  to  make  of  Cherbourg 
a  great  military  post,  an  advance  post  of  surveillance,  or,  if  need 
were,  of  defence  against  England.  A  royal  journey  was  ordina- 
rily a  solemn  and  expensive  affair.  Louis  XVI.  made  his  with- 
out pomp  and  almost  without  retinue,  taking  with  him  only  his 
first  equerry,  his  captain  of  the  guards,  his  first  gentleman  of  the 
chamber,  four  officers  of  the  Light  Guards,  and  eight  guards, 
and  refusing  all  official  receptions.  He  visited  everything  at 
Cherbourg,  was  present  on  the  day  following  his  arrival  at  three 
o'clock  in  the  morning,  at  the  immersion  of  one  of  the  cones  of 
the  dike  which  closed  the  harbour,  inspected  the  works  of  the 
citadel,  watched  the  manoeuvres  of  the  fleet  under  Monsieur  de 
Rioms,  astonishing  every  one  by  the  correctness  and  extent  of 
his  knowledge,  and  charming  every  one  by  his  benevolence 
and  simplicity.  Charming  stories  were  told  of  him,  similar  to 
those  told  of  Henri  IV.  On  passing  through  Houdan,  he  had 
entered  the  house  of  a  peasant  woman  for  a  moment.  This 
woman,  delighted  to  receive  her  king,  threw  herself  at  his  feet, 
and  besought  him  to  grant  her  a  favour.  "What  is  it?"  asked 


INSTANCES   OF   THE    KING'S    AFFABILITY.  321 

the  prince.  "  Sire,  it  is  to  kiss  you."  He  consented  with  a  good 
grace,  then  added,  "  Now  it  is  my  turn."  And  a  chronicler  re- 
lates that  the  royal  kiss  was  given  in  such  a  manner  as  to  lead 
one  to  think  that  the  occurrence  had  not  displeased  his  Majesty. 

Nor  was  this  all.  The  king  demanded  of  the  peasant  it  she 
desired  nothing  more.  "  No,  Sire,"  replied  the  woman  ;  "  I  have 
no  wants ;  I  am  now  happier  than  a  queen.  But  I  have  a  very 
poor  neighbour,  who  has  eleven  children,  and  whose  creditors 
are  threatening  to  seize  her  effects."  Louis  XVI.  sent  for  the 
neighbour,  promised  to  arrange  her  affairs,  and  kept  his  word. 

Such  anecdotes  became  known,  and  attracted  a  crowd  round 
the  monarch.  This  journey  of  eight  days  was  a  perpetual  ova- 
tion. At  Caen,  where  the  keys  of  the  city  were  presented  to 
him,  with  these  words,  "  Cordibus  apertis  inutile  s"  and  where  he 
ordered  the  guards  to  allow  every  one — "  my  children,"  as  he 
called  them  —  to  approach ;  at  Rouen,  where,  to  satisfy  the 
people,  he  walked  down  the  Rue  de  Pont;  at  Honfleur,  where 
he  saw  for  the  last  time  the  evolution  of  the  squadron ;  at  Havre, 
where  he  arrived  after  a  stormy  passage,  —  everywhere,  in  the 
army,  in  the  navy,  in  the  city,  and  in  the  country,  there  re- 
sounded that  cry  which  was  then  so  French,  "  Long  live  the 
king!  "  The  prince  was  happy  over  these  acclamations,  which 
were  becoming  rare  near  the  throne.  To  the  cry  of  "  Long  live 
the  king !  "  he  replied  with  the  cry,  "  Long  live  my  people !  " 
"  You  will,  I  think,  be  content  with  me,"  he  wrote  gayly  to  the 
queen,  to  whom  he  sent  news  every  day,  "  for  I  have  not  once,  I 
think,  made  use  of  my  gruff  tone."  He  was  delighted  with  his 
journey,  and  every  one  was  delighted  with  him.  It  seemed  as  if 
it  were  a  renewal  of  that  ancient  tie  which,  since  centuries,  had 
united  the  dynasty  and  France,  a  fresh  vow  of  loyalty  on  the 
part  of  the  people,  of  love  and  kindness  on  the  part  of  the 
king.  When  on  June  29  Louis  XVI.  returned  to  Versailles,  still 
moved  by  the  applause  of  an  entire  province,  he  took  his  second 
son,  the  Due  de  Normandie,  in  his  arms.  "  Come,  my  big  Nor- 
man," he  said  to  him,  laughing,  "  thy  name  will  bring  thee 
luck !  " 

The  queen  was  not  less  pleased  than  the  king  at  the  popular 
enthusiasm.  She  envied  it,  perhaps,  for  she  was  no  longer 
accustomed  to  it.  There  was,  however,  during  that  year  a 
renewal  of  her  popularity.  This  was  during  the  autumn,  at 
Fontainebleau. 
VOL.  i.  —  21 


322  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

"  There  was  such  a  crowd  at  Fontainebleau,"  Madame  de  Stael  wrote 
to  Gustavus  111.,  "that  you  could  only  talk  to  the  two  or  three  persons 
who  were  playing  with  you,  and  there  was  no  pleasure  to  be  got  from 
being  in  society  except  the  pleasure  of  being  stifled  ;  but  it  was  above  all 
around  the  queen  that  the  waves  of  the  crowd  surged.  .  .  .  The  ex- 
pression of  countenance  of  all  those  who  awaited  a  word  from  her  was 
a  sufficiently  interesting  study  for  the  observer.  Some  tried  to  attract  her 
attention  by  immoderate  laughing  at  what  their  neighbour  said  to  them, 
which  under  any  other  circumstance  would  probably  hardly  have  caused 
them  to  smile.  Others  assumed  a  preoccupied,  absent-minded  air,  in 
order  not  to  have  the  appearance  of  thinking  of  that  which  really  absorbed 
them.  They  turned  their  heads  in  the  opposite  direction ;  but  despite 
this,  their  eyes  were  glued  to  the  steps  of  the  queen.  Others,  when  the 
queen  asked  them  what  the  weather  was  like,  thought  that  they  must  not 
miss  such  an  occasion  of  making  themselves  known,  and  replied  at  great 
length  to  her  question  ;  but  others  again  showed  respect  without  fear,  and 
eagerness  without  avidity." 

Thus  at  the  end  of  1786,  and  even  in  the  beginning  of  1787, 
Marie  Antoinette  was  still  the  star  to  which  all  eyes  turned. 
Her  light  was  still  radiant,  though  already  somewhat  tempered 
and  veiled  by  I  know  not  what  shade  of  melancholy.  The  queen 
felt  that  she  was  growing  old;  and  already,  in  1785,  she  had 
declared  to  Mademoiselle  Bertin  that  as  she  was  nearly  thirty, 
she  had  decided  to  give  up  all  those  ornaments  which  were 
suited  to  extreme  youth,  and  that  she  would  no  longer  wear 
either  feathers  or  flowers.  She  was  no  longer  the  lively  and  gay 
young  woman  with  the  slender  waist,  the  rippling  and  sometimes 
mocking  laugh,  eager  for  pleasure  and  easily  carried  away, 
fond  of  balls,  races,  and  play.  She  was  a  woman  of  thirty,  with 
a  more  imposing  aspect,  beginning  to  grow  stout,  with  that 
amplitude  of  form  which  adds  majesty,  without  heaviness,  to 
elegance;  her  smile,  always  enchanting,  was  graver;  she  felt 
the  weight  of  the  crown,  and  was  matured  by  experience.  If 
Mercy  had  still  addressed  his  secret  reports  to  the  empress,  they 
would  no  longer  have  been  filled  with  complaints  against  the 
dissipation  and  frivolity  of  the  princess;  for  at  the  very  time 
when  Marie  Antoinette  began  to  be  the  butt  of  calumny,  she 
least  deserved  it. 

The  court  was  well  regulated ;  the  balls  were  brilliant.  All 
games  of  hazard  were  severely  forbidden ;  the  queen  banished 
from  her  table  all  high  players,  renounced  the  excitement  of  faro 


HER    GOODNESS. 


for  the  calmer  pleasure  of  billiards,  reprimanded  the  Comte 
d'Artois,  who  was  always  impetuous  and  light,  separated  herself 
from  young  people  to  discourse  from  preference  with  grave  and 
serious  men,  and,  as  an  eye-witness  has  said,  "  clearly  showed,  by 
her  attitude  and  her  conversation,  that  she  knew  how  to  preserve 
the  principles  of  honour  and  probity  among  those  who  sur- 
rounded her."  She  encouraged  arts  and  industry,  took  under  her 
protection  the  glass  manufactory  of  St.  Cloud,  and  in  order  to 
encourage  the  weaving  of  silk,  which  had  been  established  at 
Paris  by  a  Monsieur  Villiers,  declared  that  in  the  future  she 
would  wear  only  French  silks.  She  economized  in  her  dress,  and 
—  pardon  the  detail  which  is  somewhat  vulgar  but  decisive  — 
this  woman  who  was  the  arbiter  of  elegance  and  taste  had  her 
gowns  mended,  her  skirts  retrimmed,  her  slippers  resoled. 

Her  intelligence  was  quick  without  being  profound,  and  always 
kindly;  she  possessed  in  a  supreme  degree  that  obliging  memory 
which  is  so  pleasing  in  princes,  and  which  gains  for  them 
more  hearts  than  their  good  deeds.  Her  bearing  was  proud. 
Her  eye,  always  limpid,  had  become  more  penetrating.  Her 
welcome  was  impressive,  without  ceasing  to  be  affable.  Her 
familiarity  was  tempered  with  nobility,  her  grace  with  majesty. 
One  admired  the  woman,  but  was  conscious  of  the  queen.  Her 
beauty  attracted  all  eyes;  her  goodness  attracted  all  hearts;  her 
natural  dignity  commanded  respect.  "  It  is  difficult,  I  think,  to 
throw  more  grace  and  kindness  into  civility,"  Madame  de  Stae'l 
wrote.  "  She  has,  however,  a  kind  of  affability  which  does  not 
allow  you  to  forget  that  she  is  queen,  and  yet  always  persuades 
you  that  she  has  forgotten  it." 

Then  beneath  the  diadem  of  the  sovereign,  one  saw  the  smile  of 
the  mother;  she  was  there  with  her  four  children,  —  for  on  July 
9,  1786,  a  second  princess,  Sophie  Beatrix,  had  been  born.  She 
was  there  at  Fontainebleau  as  at  Versailles,  leaning  over  their 
cradle,  attentive  to  every  movement,  watching  their  sleep  with 
tenderness,  alarmed  at  the  smallest  illness,  shuddering  before  an 
attack  of  coughing,  trembling  at  a  fever,  watching  beside  their 
beds  when  they  were  inoculated,  and  pushing  her  precaution  to 
the  point  of  shutting  herself  up  with  them  in  the  chateau,  in  order 
that  they  might  not  communicate  the  contagion  to  the  children 
who  might  come  to  play  in  the  park,  following  with  a  vigilant 
eye  and  enlightened  solicitude  their  physical,  intellectual,  and 
moral  development.  She  reproved  their  impatience,  and  allowed 


324  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

them  to  exhibit  no  pride.  She  desired  her  daughter  to  have  only 
four  women ;  she  took  her  with  her  to  Fontainebleau  in  order 
not  to  lose  sight  of  her  education ;  and  during  this  time,  the  dau- 
phin, who  was  still  quite  young,  remained  at  La  Muette,  dressed 
simply  as  a  little  sailor,  accessible  to  every  one,  and  delighting  all 
by  his  affability.  There  is  not  a  letter  to  Marie  Antoinette's  friends, 
not  a  letter  to  her  brothers,  which  does  not  abound  in  details  of 
the  health  and  a  thousand  incidents  in  the  life  of  her  dear  little 
ones.  She  goes  to  see  them  at  every  hour  of  the  day  and  night ; 
and  once  when  she  had  gone  unexpectedly  to  see  the  Due  de 
Normandie,  to  whom  some  leeches  had  been  applied  without 
forewarning  her,  she  fell  in  a  faint  from  the  shock  and  the  fright. 
With  what  anguish  did  she  follow  the  first  symptoms  of  the  dis- 
ease which  was  to  carry  off  the  dauphin !  But  also  how  she 
rejoiced  in  the  good  health  of  her  second  son,  so  strong,  so  well, 
so  fresh,  —  "a  true  peasant  child,"  she  said  gayly. 

And  at  the  same  time,  what  efforts  she  made  to  form  their 
minds,  above  all,  their  hearts  !  One  year,  on  the  approach  of  the 
ist  of  January,  she  had  the  most  beautiful  playthings  brought 
from  Paris  to  Versailles ;  she  showed  them  to  her  children,  and 
when  they  had  looked  at  them  and  admired  them,  said  to  them 
that  they  were  without  doubt  very  beautiful,  but  that  it  was  still 
more  beautiful  to  distribute  alms;  and  the  price  of  these  presents 
was  sent  to  the  poor. 

Thus  she  made  her  children  serve  their  apprenticeship  in 
charity.  While  the  Abbe  d'Avaux  taught  Madame  Royale 
grammar  and  history,  the  queen  gave  her  daughter  lessons  in 
handiwork  ;  she  herself  taught  her  to  do  needle-work,  and 
accustomed  her  little  hands  to  make  chemises  and  baby  clothes, 
which  she  had  distributed  among  the  indigent  by  the  cures  of 
Versailles.  It  was  not  to  her  greatest  favourites,  but  to  the  most 
worthy,  that  she  confided  the  care  of  her  children.  When  the 
dauphin  had  arrived  at  an  age  to  have  a  governor,  neither  Mon- 
sieur de  Vaudrcuil  was  chosen,  despite  the  support  of  the  Po- 
lignacs,  nor  the  Due  de  Guines,  who  had  formerly  been  in  favour, 
nor  the  Due  de  la  Vauguyon,  although  he  had  been  educated 
with  the  king;  she  sent  for  the  Due  d'Harcourt,  in  his  province 
of  Normandy,  whose  reputation  for  honesty  was  well  established. 
The  queen  not  only  presided  over  their  education,  but  she  took 
part  in  the  games  of  her  young  family.  In  order  to  amuse  them, 
she  assembled  about  her,  at  Trianon  or  at  Versailles,  the  sons  and 


HER  AFFECTION    FOR   CHILDREN.  325 

daughters  of  the  principal  personages  of  the  court ;  she  danced 
with  them ;  she  had  them  play  comedies,  and  often  took  part  in 
them  herself.  This  love  for  children,  which  was  so  deep  in  Marie 
Antoinette,  overflowed  even  for  the  children  of  others.  The  cor- 
respondence and  memoirs  of  the  time  are  filled  with  charming 
instances  of  this  sweet  and  pure  passion.  No  beautiful  child 
appeared  at  court  that  the  queen  did  not  notice  him,  admire  him, 
and  caress  him.  One  day  it  \vas  the  little  boy  of  Madame  de 
Bombelles,  whom  she  perceived  as  he  came  out  of  Madame 
Elisabeth's  apartment;  she  stopped  him  to  look  at  him,  allowed 
him  to  play  with  her  fan,  and  told  the  happy  mother  that  she 
found  him  charming.  Another  time  it  was  Elzear  de  Sabran 
whom  she  encountered;  she  embraced  him  on  both  cheeks ;  and 
on  the  following  day  she  said  to  Madame  de  Sabran,  "  Do  you 
know  that  I  kissed  a  gentleman  yesterday?"  "  Madame,  I  know 
it,  for  he  boasted  of  it;  "  and  the  queen  laughed,  complimented 
the  mother  on  her  son,  on  his  height,  on  his  healthy  appearance, 
on  his  talent  for  playing  comedy.  And  the  mother  smiled  in 
her  turn  and  was  delighted  and  declared  that  the  queen  was 
"  adorable ;  "  and  fifty  years  later,  the  child,  who  had  grown  to 
be  an  old  man,  preserved  and  recalled  with  emotion  and  a  na'fve 
pride  the  memory  of  this  kiss  from  the  queen. 

Who  would  not  then  have  proclaimed  her,  as  the  Prince  de 
Ligne  did,  queen  by  her  grace  and  charity ;  and  who  would  not 
have  cried  with  him,  "  It  is  only  the  wicked  who  can  speak  ill  of 
her,  and  only  fools  who  will  believe  it"? 

And  yet  these  fools  and  wicked  men  were  to  be  met  with ;  and 
among  those  very  courtiers  who  pressed  about  her  to  solicit  a 
glance,  how  many  of  them  perhaps  augmented  the  number  of 
those  wicked  men  and  fools ! 

One  day  at  Trianon,  on  Sept.  16,  1786,  Madame  Campan,  on 
entering  the  chamber  of  her  royal  mistress  in  the  morning, 
found  her  still  in  bed,  holding  some  letters  in  her  hand,  and 
her  face  bathed  in  tears,  her  voice  interrupted  by  sobs.  "Ah, 
the  wicked  men,  the  monsters  !  "  the  unhappy  princess  cried.  .  .  . 
"  What  have  I  done  to  them?  ...  I  wish  I  were  dead!  "  And 
when  Madame  Campan  offered  her  some  orange-water  and  ether, 
"No,"  she  replied,  with  heart-breaking  bitterness,  "no;  if  you  love 
me,  leave  me  ;  it  would  be  better  if  I  were  dead  ! "  and  throwing 
her  arms  over  the  shoulders  of  her  first  waiting-woman,  she  burst 
into  tears. 


326  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

Madame  Campan  never  knew  what  was  the  cause  of  this  violent 
grief,  which  the  friendship  alone  of  the  Duchesse  de  Polignac 
succeeded  in  calming.  It  was  one  of  those  black  clouds  which 
threatened  to  break  over  the  country,  and  which  a  purer  breeze 
drove  away.  But  how  many  other  clouds  were  to  follow,  which 
the  breath  of  friendship  could  not  dissipate ! 

For  a  long  while  calumny  had  appeared  on  the  horizon  of  the 
queen ;  and  he  who  had  so  well  described  this  spectre  in  the  last 
piece  played  at  Trianon  was  not  free  from  the  suspicion  of  having 
aided  its  birth.  Marie  Antoinette  had  at  first  laughed  at  it,  and  had 
amused  herself  with  singing  the  couplets  wherein  the  Chevalier  de 
Boufflers  had  wittily  transformed  into  virtues  the  faults  with  which 
the  libels  had  reproached  her.  But  since  the  adventure,  either 
true  or  false,  of  the  Jew,  Angelucci,  what  a  long  road  had  been 
traversed  !  First,  it  is  the  morality  of  the  queen  that  is  impugned, 
then  her  friendships,  then  her  expenditures,  even  her  simplicity. 
They  sought  to  alienate  her  husband's  heart  from  her,  and  the 
heart  of  the  nation.  Indecent  pamphlets  appeared  ;  they  flooded 
the  court  and  the  city;  they  were  even  attached  to  the  door  of 
Notre  Dame  ;  they  were  distributed  by  the  servants  of  the  palace  ; 
they  were  fabricated  by  inspectors  of  police ;  they  glided  beneath 
the  king's  napkin.  They  were  called,  —  "The  Rise  of  Aurora;" 
"  The  Loves  of  our  Queen  ;  "  "  The  Coquette  and  the  Impotent ; " 
"  The  Trial  of  the  Three  Kings,"  -—  "  a  detestable  work  for  every 
good  Frenchman,"  as  a  chronicler  said  ;  "  The  Royal  Almanac  ;  " 
"The  Life  of  Marie  Antoinette,"  and  again,  "The  Portfolio  of  a  Red 
Heel,"  and  presently  essays  on  the  life  of  Marie  Antoinette,  and 
the  infamous  memoirs  of  Madame  de  la  Motte.  It  would  be  im- 
possible to  enumerate  them  all,  and  still  more  impossible  to  quote 
any  fragments  of  them.  The  lawsuit  concerning  the  necklace 
was  a  signal  for  a  veritable  flood  of  obloquy. 

The  authors  for  the  most  part  were  unknown  ;  Champcenetz 
was  named,  and  the  Marquis  de  Louvois,  Thevenot  de  Morande. 
The  instigators  were  better  known ;  they  were  the  enemies  of 
Choiseul,  the  D'Aiguillons,  the  Marsans,  even  the  members  of 
the  royal  family. —  Madame  Adelaide,  and  the  Due  d'Orleans,  the 
Condes,  perhaps  the  Comte  de  Provence,  —  all  those  whom  the 
power  of  the  queen  threw  into  the  shade,  whom  her  preference 
for  others  wounded,  even  those  whom  her  kindness  distinguished, 
for  the  ungrateful  were  added  to  the  envious.  Never  was  a 
more  infernal  conspiracy  contrived  with  more  cleverness,  and  by 


VISIT    OF    THE   ARCHDUKE    FERDINAND.  327 

more  various  conspirators.  Never,  alas !  was  a  plot  more  suc- 
cessful. Not  an  act,  not  a  step,  not  a  word,  but  was  travestied. 
The  queen  after  the  peace  of  1783  received  with  distinction  some 
English  noblemen  who  came  to  Versailles  and  to  Fontainebleau,  to 
forget  the  old  rivalry  of  the  two  countries.  Lord  Strathaven,  the 
Duke  of  Dorset,  Lord  Fitzgerald,  were  said  to  be  the  queen's  lovers. 
She  manifested  some  sympathy  for  some  young  Swedes  or  Aus- 
trians  who  had  come  from  their  country  to  spend  their  blood  in 
the  service  of  France,  —  Fersen,  Stedingk,  Esterhazy;  these  were 
also  called  lovers,  without  counting  the  Frenchmen,  —  Arthur  Dil- 
lon, nicknamed  the  beautiful  Dillon  ;  Edouard  Dillon,  at  the  sight 
of  whom  Marie  Antoinette's  countenance  "  became  radiant;  "  and 
that  miserable  fool  of  a  Lauzun,  and  the  Chevalier  de  Coigny  and 
the  Comte  d'Artois  and  the  Due  de  Chartres.  Obscene  songs  were 
circulated  and  received  with  avidity  in  the  salons,  though  they  were 
not  delicate  either  in  point  of  taste  or  morality.  They  were  eagerly 
received  by  Maurepas,  who  had  always  loved  indecencies,  —  above 
all,  when  he  could  use  them  as  a  weapon  against  the  power  which 
threw  him  into  the  shade.  And  one  saw  the  courtiers  ride  post- 
haste from  Versailles  to  the  opera,  to  amuse  themselves  with 
those  who  sang  of  the  pretended  good  fortune  of  the  handsome 
Dillon  or  Monsieur  de  Coigny. 

In  1785  the  Archduke  Ferdinand  and  his  wife,  following  the 
example  of  his  two  brothers,  made  a  visit  to  France,  where  his 
affability  pleased  every  one ;  but  the  presence  of  the  archduke, 
like  that  of  Maximilian,  brought  up  questions  of  precedence 
which  were  new  seeds  of  discord  in  the  royal  family.  The  Duke 
and  Duchess  of  Saxe-Teschen,  who  came  to  Versailles  a  few 
months  later,  finally  carrying  out  a  project  which  they  had  formed 
two  years  before,  avoided  this  inconvenience ;  but  if  they  were 
charmed  with  the  affability  of  the  queen,  and  with  her  conversa- 
tion, they  caught  in  Paris,  that  sojourn  of  pleasure  and  inconsis- 
tency, the  murmurs  of  calumny  and  the  first  rumblings  of  the 
storm. 

Marie  Antoinette,  in  order  to  be  nearer  the  capital,  and  to  pro- 
cure for  her  children,  especially  for  the  dauphin,  who  was  already 
suffering,  a  purer  and  fresher  air  during  the  summer,  expressed 
the  desire  to  have  the  palace  of  St.  Cloud  ;  the  king  bought  it  from 
the  Due  d'Orleans,  and  gave  it  to  his  wife.  It  was  to  be  a  resi- 
dence for  the  royal  family  during  the  extensive  repairs  which 
were  necessary  at  Versailles.  The  expense  was  not  as  considera- 


328  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

ble  as  one  imagined,  nor  disproportioned  to  the  revenues  of 
the  monarch,  since  it  was  covered  in  great  part  by  sales  that  were 
made  at  the  same  time.  No  matter;  it  was  the  acquisition  of 
St.  Cloud  which  ruined  the  finances  of  France.  Messieurs  of 
the  Inquiry  fulminated  against  Messieurs  of  the  Great  Chamber, 
who  had  registered  the  letters-patent  of  the  king,  giving  six 
millions  to  the  queen  to  enjoy  in  her  own  right,  and  to  dispose 
of  as  she  pleased,  as  well  as  of  the  estates  and  domains  which 
she  might  acquire  by  means  of  this  sum ;  and  the  voices  of 
the  salons,  the  rumour  of  the  street,  bestowed  on  Marie  An- 
toinette the  injurious  and  fatal  nickname  of  "  Madame  Deficit." 
Four  words,  printed  at  the  head  of  the  notices  attached  to 
the  park  gates,  "  De  par  la  Reine,"  —  very  natural  words, 
since  the  queen  was  at  home  at  St.  Cloud  as  at  Trianon, —  aug- 
mented the  murmurs  and  aroused  I  know  not  what  umbrageous 
susceptibility.  One  saw  therein  an  encroachment  on  the  privi- 
leges of  the  king,  an  attack  on  the  rights  of  the  House  of 
France,  which  was  to  be  despoiled  for  the  profit  of  the  House  of 
Austria;  and  D'Epremenil  cried  in  full  Parliament  that  it  was 
impolitic  and  immoral  to  see  palaces  belonging  to  the  queen  of 
France. 

Marie  Antoinette  felt  an  insurmountable  antipathy  toward 
Calonne,  whose  worth  she  had  soon  judged.  Not  only  would 
she  not  ask  him  for  any  money,  but  even  refused  what  he 
offered  her ;  the  accounts  of  the  time  affirm  this,  and  authentic 
documents  establish  it.  But  what  did  popular  malevolence  care 
for  the  truth?  They  hummed  in  the  streets  this  stanza  from  a 
potpourri,  which  was  flat  and  lacking  in  wit :  — 

"  All  love  for  Calonne  I  disclaim, 
'T  is  for  the  gold  he  '11  freely  give. 
To  him  I  turn  for  sure  reprieve 
From  debts  that  would  disgrace  my  name ; 
My  favourite  also  plays  this  game, 
And  then  we  both  laugh  in  our  sleeve,  in  our  sleeve." 

When,  on  the  fall  of  the  comptroller-general,  the  populace 
amused  itself  by  burning  his  effigy,  the  scroll  which  hung  from 
the  manikin  which  represented  him  accused  the  queen  of  having 
sent  to  her  brother  one  hundred  millions  in  three  years,  —  and 
this  at  the  moment  when  that  brother  was  reproaching  her  for 
having  become  too  French,  and  for  having  nothing  German 
about  her  but  her  face. 


MADAME    DEFICIT."  329 


Thus  calumny  descended  the  steps  of  the  throne  to  the  palace, 
from  the  palace  to  the  salon,  from  the  salon  to  the  street;  and  its 
poisoned  arrows  pierced  the  heart  of  the  unfortunate  woman 
while  waiting  to  strike  at  her  head.  In  1783  Madame  Lebrun 
painted  Marie  Antoinette  in  the  graceful  costume  she  wore  at 
Trianon,  with  her  straw  hat  and  a  white  muslin  robe;  it  was 
immediately  rumoured  that  the  queen  had  been  painted  in  her 
chemise.  Four  years  later,  in  1787,  there  was  a  similar  insult 
for  the  beautiful  picture  wherein  the  same  artist  represented 
Marie  Antoinette  surrounded  by  her  children.  The  frame  hav- 
ing been  brought  empty,  "  Ah,  here  is  Madame  Deficit!  "  some 
one  cried ;  and  this  malicious  saying,  wherein  was  associated  a 
vulgar  incident  and  an  odious  calumny,  immediately  found 
credit  with  the  public.  At  the  opera  the  queen  was  hissed.  At 
the  Theatre  Fran^ais  they  made  an  outrageous  application  to 
her  of  the  threatening  prophecies  of  Joad  against  Athalie.  A 
caricature  was  openly  sold,  which  showed  Louis  XVI.  and  Marie 
Antoinette  seated  at  a  sumptuous  table,  while  a  crowd  of  starv- 
ing people  surrounded  them,  with  this  legend:  "The  king  drinks; 
the  queen  eats;  the  people  cry."  And  a  day  came  when  the 
lieutenant  of  police  warned  the  unfortunate  princess  not  to  show 
herself  again  in  Paris,  as  she  would  not  be  safe. 

The  Comte  de  la  Marck  was  right  in  saying,  "  It  is  in  the  mali- 
cious sayings  and  lies  circulated  against  the  queen  that  we  must 
seek  the  pretext  for  the  accusations  of  the  Revolutionary  tribunal 
against  Marie  Antoinette  in  1793." 

And  as  if  all  sorrows  were  to  fall  at  the  same  time  on  that 
head  which  had  been  radiant  so  long,  friendship  itself  became 
cold.  The  favourite  so  assiduous  during  the  time  of  good  fortune 
became  indifferent  in  the  hour  of  trial. 

Between  the  queen  and  the  comptroller-general,  the  Polignacs 
decided  in  favour  of  Calonne.  The  queen  was  displeased  at  this  ; 
she  no  longer  went  to  her  friend's  house  without  having  first 
asked  what  persons  were  there;  and  often  after  the  reply,  she 
abstained  from  going  thither  altogether.  Madame  de  Polignac, 
instead  of  being  touched,  was  hurt;  and  one  day  when  her  royal 
mistress  made  some  affectionate  observations  to  her  concerning 
it,  "  I  think,"  she  replied  in  a  cold  tone,  "  that  because  your 
Majesty  wishes  to  come  to  my  salon,  that  is  not  a  reason  for  you 
to  assume  to  exclude  my  friends."  The  queen,  who  was  loyal 
in  her  affections,  did  not  show  that  she  was  hurt  at  this  imperti- 


330  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

nent  reply ;  she  did  more,  she  excused  it.  "  I  am  not  angry  with 
Madame  de  Polignac,"  she  said;  "at  bottom  she  is  good  and  she 
loves  me,  but  those  about  her  have  subjugated  her."  She  con- 
tented herself  with  deserting  the  salon  of  her  former  favourite, 
and  separating  herself  from  the  young  people  of  her  set,  and 
bestowed  her  preference  upon  a  woman  who  was  sweeter,  more 
devoted,  and  totally  free  from  ulterior  motives,  the  Comtesse 
d'Ossun;  and  her  two  friends,  Mercy  and  Fersen,  following  the 
example  of  the  queen,  deserted,  in  their  turn,  the  Polignac  circle. 

The  favourite's  set  was  displeased  at  an  estrangement  which 
was  likely  to  separate  them  from  the  source  of  all  benefits ;  they 
became  jealous  of  the  growing  favour  of  Madame  d'Ossun,  and 
did  not  hide  their  irritation.  Madame  de  Polignac  departed  to 
go  to  some  springs,  and  threatened  to  hand  in  her  resignation ; 
and  her  friends  made  common  cause  with  the  enemies  of  Marie 
Antoinette  in  their  war  of  songs  and  perfidious  insinuations. 
They  talked  maliciously  of  a  schottische  danced  by  the  queen 
with  Lord  Strathoven  at  the  house  of  Madame  d'Ossun.  One 
of  the  habitues  of  the  Polignac  salon,  who  more  than  any  other 
owed  profound  gratitude  and  respect  to  the  queen,  wrote  one  of 
the  most  wicked  couplets  against  her;  and  this  couplet,  founded 
on  an  odious  lie,  went  to  nourish  those  echoes  of  Paris  and  Ver- 
sailles which  for  a  long  time  had  repeated  only  calumny. 

To  the  desertions  of  her  friends  were  added  the  sorrows  of  a 
mother.  On  Wednesday,  June  15,  1787,  the  youngest  daughter 
of  Marie  Antoinette,  Sophie  Beatrix,  only  eleven  months  old, 
was  taken  with  a  vague  indisposition;  on  the  iQth  she  died, 
charming  in  her  death,  but  inflicting  upon  the  heart  of  the  poor 
mother  that  incurable  wound  dealt  by  the  first  loss  of  a  child. 
The  queen,  profoundly  grieved,  shut  herself  up  at  Trianon  with- 
out equipage  or  retinue,  alone  with  the  king  and  Madame  Elisa- 
beth. "  Come,"  she  wrote  to  her  sister-in-law,  "  we  shall  weep 
over  the  death  of  my  poor  little  angel.  ...  I  have  need  of  your 
heart  to  console  mine." 

And  when  some  of  her  intimate  friends,  to  soften  her  grief, 
reminded  her  of  the  youth  of  the  young  princess,  "  Do  you  for- 
get," she  replied,  "that  she  would  have  been  a  friend?" 

A  friend !  she  had  greater  need  of  one  than  ever;  and  not  find- 
ing one  on  earth,  she  sought  one  on  high.  "  For  some  time," 
the  ambassador  from  Sweden  wrote,  "  the  queen  seems  to  have 
turned  devout." 


SHE   TURNS   TO   POLITICS.  331 

Assailed  as  woman,  as  friend,  as  mother,  she  yielded,  as  she 
herself  said,  to  her  "  unfortunate  destiny."  Despite  her  repug- 
nance for  affairs,  she  threw  herself  into  the  struggle,  but  not 
without  uttering  this  cry  of  despair,  which  Madame  Campan  has 
preserved  :  "  Ah,  there  is  no  more  happiness  for  me,  since  they 
have  made  me  a  politician!" 


CHAPTER   XXII. 

THE  NOTABLES.  —  FALL  OF  CALONNE.  —  BRIEXXE  ;  HIS  REFORMS  ; 
HIS  UNPOPULARITY  RECOILS  UPOX  THE  QUEEX.  —  RECALL  OF 
NECKER. —  COXVOCATIOX  OF  THE  STATES-GEXERAL. —  A  FLOOD  OF 
BROCHURES.  —  DECEIT  OF  THIERS.  —  SITUATION  OF  MARIE  ANTOI- 
NETTE IN  1789  IN  RELATION  TO  THE  ROYAL  FAMILY.  —  THE  COMTK 
AND  COMTESSE  DE  PROVENCE.  —  THE  COMTE  AND  COMTESSE  D'AR- 
TOIS.  —  MADAME  ELISABETH. —  MADAME. —  THE  COXDES.  —  THK 
Due  D'ORLEANS. 

T~\ESPITE  his  pretension,  Calonne  had  not  succeeded  in  over- 
JL^J  coming  the  deficit  in  the  treasury.  He  had  done  worse; 
he  had  sensibly  augmented  it.  Parliament  was  hostile ;  the  public 
was  alarmed ;  his  financial  scheme  had  failed.  The  comptroller- 
general  resolved  upon  a  grand  coup  ;  he  proposed  to  the  king  to 
convoke  an  Assembly  of  Notables.  Louis  XVI.  adopted  the  idea 
with  enthusiasm ;  the  notion  of  imitating  Henri  IV.,  of  drawing 
near  to  his  people,  or  at  least  to  their  principal  representatives, 
of  speaking  to  them  face  to  face,  and  in  a  way  frankly,  pleased 
his  generous  heart  and  passion  for  the  public  good.  On  the  day 
following  that  on  which  he  had  declared  to  his  council  his  inten- 
tion of  convoking  the  Notables,  he  wrote  to  Calonne,— 

"  I  was  not  able  to  sleep  last  night,  but  it  was  from  pleasure." 
The  queen  had  not  been  informed  of  this  project.  She  was 
hurt,  so  it  was  said,  at  this  silence,  and  remained  for  several 
hours  pensive  and  silent.  Although  she  took  a  smaller  part  in 
politics  than  was  thought  abroad  and  by  the  public,  she  was 
beginning  to  realize  the  true  state  of  affairs,  —  the  present,  with 
its  difficulties  ;  the  future,  with  its  perils.  The  king  had  only 
confided  his  intention  to  the  keeper  of  the  seals,  Miromenil, 
and  to  Vergennes,  who,  since  the  death  of  the  Comte  de  Maure- 
pas,  had  fulfilled  the  functions  of  prime  minister  without  having 
the  title.  Unfortunately,  nine  days  before  the  opening  of  the 
Assembly,  on  Feb.  13,  1797,  Vergennes  died.  This  was  at  this 


CALONNE'S    PLANS.  333 


moment  a  very  great  loss.  The  calm  and  cool  judgment  of  that 
minister,  his  great  experience  of  men  and  things,  the  confidence 
which  the  king  placed  in  him,  the  consideration  which  he  en- 
joyed, would  have  given  weight  to  the  plans  of  Calonne,  and 
might  have  insured  their  success.  With  him  dead,  there  was  no 
one  in  the  ministry  whose  influence  was  preponderant  enough  to 
direct  opinion.  Montmorin.  who  succeeded  him,  had  neither 
his  talent  nor  his  authority;  and  Breteuil  had  but  mediocre  intel- 
ligence, and  was  moreover  unpopular  because  of  his  brusqueness, 
besides  being  the  inveterate  enemy  of  the  comptroller-general. 

The  delay  in  opening  the  Assembly,  successively  fixed  for  Jan- 
uary 29,  then  for  February  22,  was  a  mistake.  The  Notables,  who 
had  arrived  in  Paris  a  month  before,  not  knowing  what  to  do  with 
themselves,  and  annoyed  at  the  delay  and  the  time  which  they 
were  obliged  to  lose,  had  no  other  occupation  but  to  listen  to  the 
criticisms  and  receive  the  complaints  of  the  malcontents.  The 
public  was  impatient,  on  its  side.  They  already  laughed  and 
sung  and  announced  that  the  great  troop  of  Monsieur  de  Calonne 
was  about  to  give  the  first  representations  of  the  "  False  Appear- 
ances of  Debts  and  of  Repudiation." 

The  plans  of  the  minister  were  vast.  They  comprised  the 
suppression  or  lessening  of  certain  taxes,  such  as  the  capitation 
tax  and  the  tax  on  salt,  a  more  equal  distribution  of  the  income 
tax,  which  was  to  strike  at  the  same  time  all  proprietors, 
whether  privileged  or  not,  and  the  establishment  in  the  whole 
kingdom  of  parish,  district,  and  provincial  assemblies.  It  was  a 
political  reform  as  well  as  a  financial  reform,  —  a  wise  reform, 
on  the  whole,  whose  peaceful  realization  would  perhaps  have 
prevented  many  disasters.  But  in  politics  it  is  often  less  the* 
idea  than  the  man  who  is  rejected,  and  unfortunately  the  comp- 
troller-general was  so  despised  that  his  name  was  enough  to  dis- 
credit the  most  useful  measure.  At  the  same  time,  his  levity 
prevented  him  from  foreseeing  obstacles  or  contriving  the  means 
to  overcome  them.  It  would  have  been  easy,  since  the  king  had 
reserved  to  himself  the  choice  of  the  Notables,  to  make  up  an 
assembly  of  enlightened  and  loyal  men,  determined  to  vote  for 
a  reform  which,  for  the  most  part,  would  have  been  a  sacrifice  for 
them,  —  in  a  word,  to  insure  for  himself  a  majority.  Calonne 
neglected  even  this  precaution ;  and  from  the  start  it  was  easy  to 
see  that  there  would  be  a  formidable  opposition,  more  hostile, 
perhaps,  to  the  person  of  the  minister  than  to  his  plan.  Feeling 


334  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 


himself  attacked,  Calonne  made  the  mistake  of  attacking  in  his 
turn.  His  address  to  the  Notables,  with  an  explanation  of  his 
own  system,  contained  a  disguised  but  transparent  criticism  of 
the  administration  of  Necker.  Necker  replied ;  his  friends  took 
sides  in  the  struggle;  those  whose  privileges  were  threatened 
defended  their  rights ;  the  Notables,  hurt  by  certain  publications, 
exacted  statements  of  receipt  and  expenditure.  There  was  a 
deluge  of  recrimination  and  of  complaints  —  some  of  them  just, 
others  of  them  violent  —  against  a  minister  whose  administration 
gave  so  many  openings  to  criticism,  and  whose  reputation 
accorded  but  ill  with  his  protestations  of  disinterestedness  and 
economy.  At  the  end  of  six  weeks,  on  April  8,  Calonne  fell. 
Exiled  to  his  estate  of  Allouville,  in  Lorraine,  he  departed, 
furious  with  the  queen,  to  whom  both  he  and  public  opinion 
attributed  his  disgrace  and  exile.  Then  when  Parliament  pres- 
ently decreed  his  arrest,  he  lost  his  head,  and  with  an  utter 
disregard  of  appearances,  fled  to  London,  where,  if  \ve  may 
believe  Madame  Campan,  his  rancour  made  him  the  accomplice 
of  Madame  de  la  Motte  in  the  composition  of  her  infamous 
memorials  against  Marie  Antoinette. 

Who  should  replace  him  as  comptroller-general?  Choiseul 
had  died  on  Sunday,  May  9,  1785,  carrying  with  him  into  the 
tomb,  as  it  were,  a  last  souvenir  of  the  happiness  of  the  queen. 
Two  names  were  proposed  as  successors  to  Calonne,  —  Necker 
and  the  archbishop  of  Toulouse,  Lomenie  de  Brienne.  The 
king  felt  an  equal  repugnance  to  them  both.  "I  have  no  wish," 
he  said  one  day,  "  either  for  Necker  or  the  priest."  He  did  not 
deny  the  talents  of  Necker,  but  he  feared  the  defects  of  his 
'character;  and  hurt  by  the  publication  of  his  work  on  the 
"  Administration  of  the  Finances,"  he  had  recently,  at  the  insti- 
gation of  Calonne,  exiled  him  to  forty  leagues  from  the  capital. 

To  recall  him  at  that  moment,  and  still  more,  to  give  him  a 
portfolio,  was  openly  to  give  the  lie  to  himself,  and  to  shake 
with  his  own  hands  the  prestige  of  the  royal  authority,  which 
was  already  too  much  weakened.  If  a  few  faithful  friends,  like 
Montmorin,  still  urged  the  name  of  Necker,  the  situation  itself 
seemed  to  indicate  that  of  the  archbishop  of  Toulouse.  His  in- 
fluence over  the  Notables,  his  position  as  the  avowed  chief  of  the 
opposition  against  Calonne,  and  what  we  to-day  call  the  regular 
rotation  of  Parliamentary  institutions,  naturally  designated  him  as 
the  successor  of  the  minister  whose  fall  he  had  brought  about. 


THE   APPOINTMENT    OF    BRIENNE.  335 

Ambitious,  determined  from  his  infancy  to  play  a  great  role, 
pursuing  his  ends  by  every  means,  but  patient  and  resolute  in 
waiting,  insinuating  and  versatile,  knowing  how  to  applaud  the 
philosophers  and  to  mourn  for  the  Jesuits  at  the  same  time, 
welcomed  by  women,  regarded  with  favour  by  the  economists, 
exhibiting  superficial  but  varied  accomplishments,  Brienne  en- 
joyed in  the  whole  kingdom  a  reputation  for  incontestable 
cleverness. 

The  king  alone  felt  for  this  priest,  who  had  no  morality  and 
perhaps  no  faith,  the  aversion  which,  with  his  strong  religious 
convictions,  he  felt  for  all  philosophical  priests.  When  on  the 
death  of  Monseigneur  Beaumont,  archbishop  of  Paris,  Monsieur 
de  Brienne  was  proposed  as  his  successor,  "  It  is  at  least  neces- 
sary that  the  archbishop  of  Paris  should  believe  in  God,"  he  had 
answered  brusquely.  He  had,  moreover,  extreme  repugnance  to 
admit  a  priest  into  his  council ;  and  more  than  once  he  had  been 
heard  to  declare  that  he  should  never  place  an  ecclesiastic  at  the 
head  of  affairs. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  queen  had  a  high  opinion  of  the  arch- 
bishop of  Toulouse,  and  had  been  accustomed  for  a  long  time  to 
regard  him  as  the  future  prime  minister.  One  has  attributed  this 
opinion  of  Marie  Antoinette  to  the  exclusive  influence  of  the 
Abbe  de  Vermond,  who  was  eager  to  show  his  gratitude  to  the 
man  to  whom  he  owed  his  fortune.  If  the  queen  had  such  es- 
teem for  the  talents  of  Brienne  as  to  determine  her  to  urge  his 
elevation,  it  is  not  the  Abbe  de  Vermond  alone  who  must  be 
held  responsible  for  it,  but  every  one,  —  Choiseul,  who  had  for- 
merly recommended  the  young  Lomenie  to  Louis  XV. ;  the 
financier  of  Invaux,  who  consulted  and  wrote  to  him,  "I  ought 
to  cede  the  comptroller-generalship  to  you  ;  "  Mercy,  who,  since 
1775,  had  proclaimed  the  superiority  of  the  archbishop's  talents 
and  had  almost  gone  surety  for  his  conduct  in  religion  and 
morals;  Joseph  II.,  who  two  years  later,  after  a  conversation 
which  pleased  him  infinitely,  went  to  visit  him  at  Toulouse,  and 
conceived  of  him  so  high  an  opinion  that  he  wrote  to  his  sister 
to  recommend  him  to  her  as  one  of  the  persons  most  capable 
and  most  fit  to  enter  the  ministry.  Both  Turgot  and  Malesherbes 
wished  to  confide  to  him  a  portfolio,  and  only  gave  it  up  because 
of  the  opposition  of  Maurepas.  Maurepas  himself  only  wished 
to  keep  him  out  of  the  council  because  he  regarded  him  as  a 
rival  whose  superiority  might  throw  him  into  the  shade.  The 


336  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

States  of  Languedoc,  it  was  said,  did  not  cease  to  render  hom- 
age to  his  merits  and  to  his  intelligence,  to  the  interest  which  he 
took  in  the  affairs  of  the  province,  to  the  talent  with  which  he 
directed  various  measures  of  public  usefulness  and  chanty.  It 
was,  in  a  word,  the  general  sentiment  that  Brienne  was  one  of  the 
first  personages  in  France,  and  fitted  for  the  first  role. 

With  such  support,  and  with  such  public  opinion,  Vermond 
had  no  great  need  to  persuade  his  former  pupil  that  she  was 
doing  a  wise  and  patriotic  deed  in  placing  a  man  in  power  whom 
the  public  voice  called  there.  If  the  results  did  not  answer  to 
the  brilliant  expectations ;  if  one  perceived  too  late  that  he  was 
superficial  rather  than  profound,  —  at  least  we  must  acknowledge 
that  the  queen  was  not  the  only  one  deceived,  and  that  her  illu- 
sion was  that  of  the  whole,  or  almost  of  the  whole  nation. 
Brienne's  fame  was  brilliant;  she  thought  it  substantial. 

The  friends  of  Necker  rendered  such  homage  to  the  reputation 
of  him  whom  they  were  later  to  attack  so  violently  that  the  most 
influential  among  them  did  not  hesitate  to  open  a  negotiation  in 
order  to  place  the  two  rivals  in  the  ministry  together.  The 
Marechal  de  Beauvau  conducted  the  affair;  it  was  agreed  that 
the  archbishop  should  be  the  first  to  enter,  and  that  three 
months  later  he  should  give  the  direction  of  the  finances  to 
Necker.  The  king,  urged  at  the  same  time  by  both  parties, 
ended,  despite  his  personal  repugnance,  by  believing  that  the 
public  demanded  the  nomination  of  Monsieur  de  Brienne.  He 
spoke  of  it  to  the  queen :  "  I  have  always  heard  Monsieur  de 
Brienne  spoken  of  as  a  very  distinguished  man ;  "  that  princess 
replied,  "  I  shall  see  him  enter  the  ministry  with  pleasure." 

On  the  1st  of  May,  1787,  the  archbishop  of  Toulouse  was 
made  chief  of  the  council  of  finance;  Monsieur  de  Fourqueux, 
who  had  filled  the  interval  after  the  fall  of  Calonne,  an  honest 
man,  but  without  talent,  was  replaced  by  Monsieur  de  Villedeuil ; 
and  Necker  was  once  more  set  aside.  The  Due  de  Nivernais 
entered  the  council ;  Monsieur  de  Malesherbes  was  also  recalled. 
But  Brienne  was  one  of  those  men  who,  according  to  the  saying 
of  the  poet,  shone  in  the  second  rank,  but  went  under  an  eclipse 
in  the  first.  Having  arrived  at  the  summit  of  his  desires,  he 
soon  revealed  himself  such  as  he  was,  —  without  great  views,  with- 
out serious  knowledge,  without?  ideas,  and  without  plan.  In- 
capable of  any  innovations,  he  was  only  able  to  resume  with 
slight  modifications  the  schemes  of  Calonne;  and  at  the  end  of 


DISSOLUTION  OF  THE  ASSEMBLY  OF  NOTABLES.      337 

a  month  the  Assembly  of  the  Notables  was  dissolved,  without 
having  accomplished  anything,  leaving  the  finances  in  disorder, 
the  public  apprised  of  the  disorder,  the  royal  authority  weakened, 
since  it  had  been  obliged  to  yield,  and  their  own  prestige  gone, 
since  they  had  realized  none  of  their  solemn  promises,  carrying 
away  with  them  and  sowing  in  their  own  provinces  the  germs  of 
discontent  and  revolution. 

It  would  seem  that  once  alone  and  rid  of  the  Notables,  who, 
moreover,  before  their  departure  had  given  him  a  species  of  carte 
blanche,  Brienne  would  act  with  promptitude  and  vigour.  He 
did  nothing  of  the  sort;  he  lost  precious  time,  undertook  insuf- 
ficient measures,  and  when  he  finally  sent  the  acts  which  decreed 
the  principal  financial  reforms  for  registration,  the  resistance 
which  he  had  no  longer  to  fear  from  the  Notables  he  found  more 
obstinate  and  implacable  from  Parliament. 

Jealous  of  the  popularity  which  had  for  a  moment  surrounded 
the  Notables  when  they  had  fought  Calonne,  displeased  with  the 
court,  since  it  had  offended  it  in  the  affair  of  the  necklace,  Parlia- 
ment had  become  more  and  more  determined  in  its  course  of  oppo- 
sition. This  ardent  defender  of  the  rights  of  the  people  made  itself 
the  champion  of  the  privileged,  because  at  that  moment  the  privi- 
leged were  struggling  against  the  government.  Some  of  the  coun- 
cillors, like  D'Epremenil,  Freteau,  Duport,  fanned  the  flame  and 
added  fuel  to  the  fire.  They  declared  that  before  consenting  to 
a  new  tax  they  must  know  the  condition  of  the  treasury;  their 
pretension  was  denied.  "  You  would  demand  to  know  the  state  of 
receipt  and  expenditure,"  the  Abbe  Sabattier  cried.  "  We  de- 
mand the  States-General."  .  .  .  The  redoubtable  question  had 
been  opened,  and  with  characteristic  French  levity  had  been 
propounded  by  a  play  of  words.  D'Epremenil  developed  with 
warmth  the  idea  of  the  Abbe  Sabattier ;  and  Parliament,  carried 
away  by  his  fiery  eloquence,  made  the  following  declaration :  — 

"  The  Nation,  represented  by  the  States-General,  alone  has  the  right 
to  grant  subsidies  to  the  king,  the  necessity  for  which  must  first  have 
been  clearly  demonstrated." 

The  emotion  was  great  among  serious  men  and  the  old  council- 
lors. President  d'Ormesson,  turning  to  the  ardent  adversary  of  the 
court,  pronounced  in  a  sad  voice  these  prophetic  words,  "  Take 
care,  Monsieur,  that  Providence  does  not  punish  your  fatal  coun- 
sels by  granting  your  wishes." 
VOL.  i.  —  22 


338  LIFE    OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

On  August  6  a  bed  of  justice  was  held  at  Versailles  to  have  the 
edicts  authoritatively  registered.  On  the  following  day  Parliament 
protested,  and  declared  the  transaction,  which  had  been  enregis- 
tered,  void;  it  was  exiled  to  Troyes. 

A  month  later  it  was  recalled.  The  government  oscillated  with- 
out ceasing,  like  a  man  who  is  about  to  fall,  incapable  of  walking 
firmly  either  along  the  path  of  resistance  or  in  that  of  compromise  ; 
it  acted  with  vigour  one  day  only  to  be  timid  and  retreat  the  next. 
The  struggle  soon  began.  The  Due  d'Orleans,  who  had  taken 
sides  with  Parliament,  was  exiled  to  Villers-Cotteret ;  two  coun- 
cillors, the  Abbe  Sabattier  and  Freteau,  were  imprisoned,  then 
banished ;  presently  two  others,  D'Epremenil  and  Montsabart, 
were  arrested  with  military  parade,  and  under  dramatic  circum- 
stances, which  struck  the  popular  imagination  and  aroused  all 
minds.  Finally  on  May  8,  1788,  at  a  new  bed  of  justice,  the  king 
ordered  the  registration  of  several  edicts,  one  of  which,  estab- 
lishing forty-seven  great  bailiwicks,  sensibly  modified  the  juris- 
diction of  the  Parliaments,  and  another  of  which  took  away  from 
them  the  registration  of  the  laws,  to  give  it  to  a  plenary  court. 

The  public,  violently  excited  by  all  of  these  measures,  pro- 
nounced against  the  ministers ;  the  Due  d'Orleans,  who  until 
then  had  been  decried  and  despised,  became  a  popular  hero;  the 
imprisoned  councillors  were  venerated  as  martyrs  to  liberty. 
Troubles  broke  out  on  all  sides,  —  in  Bretagne,  in  Dauphine,  in 
Provence,  in  Beam,  in  Languedoc.  The  agitation  descended  to 
the  street.  France  was  on  fire. 

Of  all  the  reforms  undertaken  by  Brienne,  and  the  Assembly  of 
Notables  before  their  separation,  only  one  perhaps  was  popular,  — 
that  ordering  changes  and  retrenchment  in  the  households  of  the 
king  and  queen.  These  changes  went  into  effect  on  April  19, 
1787.  The  Life  Guards  were  reduced  to  four  squadrons  of  two 
hundred  and  fifty  men;  the  corps  of  the  gendarmerie,  the  light 
horse,  the  guards  of  the  gate,  were  suppressed.  The  queen  was 
most  ardent  in  preaching  economy;  she  greatly  regretted  that 
the  true  condition  of  the  treasury  had  been  hidden  from  her. 
"  If  I  had  known  it,"  she  said,  "  I  should  never  have  made  so  many 
acquisitions,  and  I  should  have  been  the  first  to  set  the  example 
of  reform  in  my  household  ;  but  how  could  I  form  any  idea  of  this 
distress,  since  when  I  asked  for  thirty  thousand  francs,  they  sent 
me  sixty?  "  From  the  opening  of  the  Assembly  of  the  Notables 
she  had  given  up  play,  and  had  dismissed  the  bankers  who  held 


RETRENCHMENTS  IN  THE  ROYAL  HOUSEHOLD.  339 

it.  Three  young  men  who  had  played  despite  her  prohibition 
were  sent  back  to  their  regiment.  In  the  month  of  August  the 
economies  were  more  considerable  and  of  greater  extent.  The 
queen  made  retrenchments  in  the  number  of  her  horses,  in  her 
table,  in  her  toilet.  She  dismissed  Mademoiselle  Bertin,  sus- 
pended work  on  St.  Cloud,  gave  up  her  balls,  and  requested 
the  Due  de  Polignac  to  hand  in  his  resignation  as  director-general 
of  the  post-roads,  which  had  been  given  him  some  years  before, 
and  which  they  now  wished  to  unite  to  the  letter-post,  in  the  hands 
of  Monsieur  d'Ogny.  The  king  put  down  his  wolf  and  boar  hunt- 
ing establishments,  suppressed  the  falconry,  united  his  small  stable 
with  his  great,  and  decided  to  sell  several  of  the  royal  houses,  such 
as  La  Muette  and  Choisy. 

But  all  these  reforms  seemed  insufficient  in  the  eyes  of  the 
public;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  they  displeased  to  the  last 
degree  those  who  suffered  from  them,  some  of  whom  were  not 
able  to  pay  their  debts.  The  Due  de  Polignac  did  not  give 
up  without  bitterness  an  income  of  fifty  thousand  francs,  nor 
Monsieur  de  Vaudreuil  his  place  as  grand  falconer.  The  Due  de 
Coigny,  first  equerry,  made  a  violent  scene  before  the  king;  and 
the  Baron  de  Besenval  protested  that  it  was  frightful  to  live  in  a 
country  where  one  was  not  sure  of  possessing  on  the  morrow 
what  one  had  to-day.  "  One  only  sees  such  things  in  Turkey," 
he  said  angrily. 

The  uproar  was  increased  by  seeing  Brienne,  in  the  midst  of 
these  retrenchments,  heap  upon  his  own  head  and  those  of  his 
relatives  honours  and  riches.  Under  the  pretext  that  the  dis- 
turbed situation  of  the  country  demanded  a  single  direction  of 
the  government,  he  had  had  himself  made  principal  minister; 
and  the  Marechals  de  Segur  and  de  Castries  having  refused  to 
accept  subordinate  positions  under  him,  he  gave  the  portfolio  of 
war  to  his  brother,  the  Comte  de  Brienne,  —  a  person  of  but  me- 
diocre talent.  On  the  death  of  the  archbishop  of  Sens,  he  ex- 
changed his  seat  of  Toulouse  for  that  of  Sens,  whose  revenues 
were  much  more  considerable ;  and  it  was  said  that  a  single 
cutting  of  wood  on  one  of  his  estates  brought  him  nine  hun- 
dred thousand  francs,  —  exorbitant  advantages,  which  exasperated 
France. 

At  the  same  time,  from  an  exaggerated  love  of  peace,  or 
rather  in  consequence  of  the  disorder  in  the  finances,  the  min- 
istry, despite  the  appeals  of  the  Marechal  de  Segur,  allowed  the 


340  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

patriots  of  Holland,  who  were  friends  and  allies  of  France,  to  be 
crushed  by  the  stadtholder,  who  had  always  been  hostile  to  us, 
and  who  favoured  England  and  Prussia,  —  a  grave  mistake, 
which  shook  our  influence  in  Europe,  and  which  in  France 
added  the  just  complaints  of  statesmen  to  those  of  the  soldiers, 
and  to  the  passionate  recriminations  of  the  men  belonging  to  the 
court  and  to  the  wardrobe.  The  brilliancy  of  the  embassy  sent 
by  Tippoo  Sai'b,  and  the  hope  of  a  useful  alliance  with  India,  did 
not  suffice  to  wipe  out  the  disgrace  of  such  a  desertion. 

The  dissatisfaction  with  Brienne  was  universal,  and  part  of  this 
discontent  recoiled  upon  the  queen.  It  was  she  who  had  made 
the  archbishop  minister;  it  was  she  who  maintained  him  in  his 
position.  She  had,  thanks  to  him,  so  it  was  said,  entered  the 
council ;  she  was  held  responsible  for  the  resolutions  therein 
taken.  The  truth  is,  that  in  face  of  the  general  fermentation,  of 
the  menacing  attitude  of  Parliament,  and  of  the  wind  of  revo- 
lution which  was  then  whistling  through  all  the  provinces,  the 
queen  thought  it  necessary  to  bring  to  the  defence  of  authority 
great  consistency  of  idea  and  firmness  of  action.  Her  natural 
pride  inclined  her  toward  energetic  measures;  but  she  had  not 
resolved  upon  them  without  a  certain  hesitation.  While  be- 
lieving them  useful,  she  regretted  the  changes  made  in  the  organi- 
zation of  Parliament,  and  she  had  an  extreme  repugnance  to  all 
severity.  Her  reason  thought  it  necessary,  but  her  kindness 
took  alarm.  "  It  is  sad,"  she  wrote,  "  to  be  obliged  to  resort  to 
rigorous  measures,  of  which  one  cannot  previously  calculate  the 
extent." 

Moreover,  inexperienced  in  government  affairs,  forced  without 
preparation,  by  the  misfortunes  of  her  life  and  the  necessity  of 
self-defence,  to  concern  herself  with  them,  from  participation  in 
which  the  ministers  had  previously  systematically  excluded  her; 
possessing  great  force  of  character,  but  ignorant  of  how  to  make 
use  of  it,  —  it  was  not  she  who  gave  the  impulse,  but  followed  it,  at 
most  giving  her  assent.  But  infernal  malevolence  was  implacable 
in  regarding  her  as  the  author  of  all  evils.  They  accused  her 
of  prodigality  in  connection  with  Calonne;  they  accused  her  of 
despotism  in  connection  with  Brienne ;  odious  caricatures  and 
abominable  placards  associated  her  name  writh  that  of  Frede- 
gonde,  with  Isabeau  of  Bavaria,  with  Catherine  de  Medicis.  A 
correspondent  of  the  archbishop  of  Lyons  denounced  her  as  the 
"  invisible  power  hidden  behind  the  curtain ;  "  and  Parliament 


THE    CONVOCATION    OF  THE    STATES-GENERAL.      341 

itself,  in  its  remonstrances,  dared  to  say  to  the  king,  "  Such  meas- 
ures, Sire,  do  not  spring  from  your  heart ;  such  examples  are 
not  according  to  the  principles  of  your  Majesty:  they  come  from 
another  source."  It  would  have  been  difficult  to  designate  the 
queen  more  clearly.  When,  on  March  10,  1792,  Vergniaud  pro- 
nounced that  violent  diatribe  against  Marie  Antoinette  which 
denounced  her  to  the  fury  of  the  populace,  he  only  followed  the 
example  set  four  years  before  by  the  magistrates  who  sat  beneath 
the  fleur-de-lis. 

Thus  politics,  from  which  she  had  instinctively  sought  to  keep 
aloof  for  so  long  a  time,  despite  the  exhortations  of  Maria  Theresa, 
Mercy,  and  Joseph  II.,  brought  her  misfortune  as  soon  as  she 
meddled  with  them.  How  much  happier  she  would  have  been 
had  she  remained  in  her  apartment  with  her  needle-work,  as  one 
of  the  musicians  of  the  chapel  choir  ruefully  remarked  to  her  one 
day !  But  in  the  path  which  necessity  had  constrained  her  to 
enter,  despite  herself,  there  was  no  turning  back. 

The  words  which  the  Abbe  Sabattier  let  fall,  and  which  had 
been  caught  up  by  D'Epremenil,  were  echoed  by  the  entire 
country.  The  States-General!  It  would  seem  that  this  magic 
word  alone  could  give  back  to  weakened  and  divided  France 
peace,  riches,  and  prestige.  The  Court  of  the  Coadjutors  de- 
clared in  their  turn  that  they  had  a  better  right  than  any  other  to 
demand  the  States-General,  since  it  had  been  created  by  them. 
The  Assembly  of  the  Clergy  demanded  the  convocation,  with  brief 
delay,  of  the  States-General,  and  employing  for  the  first  time  a 
new  language,  said  to  the  king,  "  The  glory  of  your  Majesty  lies 
not  in  being  king  of  France,  but  in  being  king  of  the  French." 

The  movement  was  so  lively  and  so  universal  that  Brienne 
thought  himself  forced  to  yield  to  it.  A  decree  of  the  council  of 
July  5  announced  the  convocation  of  the  States-General,  but  with- 
out indicating  any  date.  A  decree  of  August  8  fixed  it  for  May  I, 
1789.  This  concession  did  not  appease  the  public,  unanimously 
aroused  against  the  principal  minister.  They  accepted  the  con- 
vocation of  the  States-General,  but  they  did  not  wish  to  receive 
it  from  the  hands  of  Brienne.  A  decree  of  August  16,  declaring 
that  until  the  end  of  the  year  all  payments  of  the  State  should 
be  made  half  in  silver  and  half  in  notes  of  the  treasury,  put  the 
finishing  touch  to  the  exasperation  of  the  public ;  they  saw 
therein  disguised  bankruptcy.  The  archbishop,  not  knowing 
what  to  do,  but  clinging  desperately  to  his  power,  had  the  office 


342  LIFE    OF    MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

of  comptroller-general  proposed  to  Necker.  It  was  Mercy,  who, 
on  the  request  of  the  king  and  queen,  became  the  intermediary 
in  this  negotiation.  Necker  replied,  as  the  queen  had  foreseen, 
that  "  he  would  be  without  power  and  without  means  if  he  were 
associated  with  a  person  who  unfortunately  was  distrusted  by 
the  public,  but  who,  nevertheless,  was  believed  to  possess  great 
power."  He  refused  to  unite  his  fortune  to  that  of  the  archbishop. 

What  to  do?  The  king  had  ever  an  extreme  repugnance  to 
recall  Necker  to  power ;  the  queen  could  not  make  up  her  mind 
to  sacrifice  Brienne,  on  whose  score  her  eyes  were  not  yet  en- 
tirely open.  It  was  necessary,  however,  under  penalty  of  making 
every  reform  impossible  and  every  revolt  irresistible.  The  cry 
of  the  public  grew  louder  and  more  pressing.  The  queen  sent 
for  the  minister,  and  although  it  cost  her  something,  declared 
that  it  was  necessary  to  yield  before  the  storm.  Always  avari- 
cious, Brienne  demanded  and  obtained  a  cardinal's  hat  for  him- 
self, and  for  his  niece  a  place  as  lady  of  the  palace. 

On  the  following  day  Marie  Antoinette  wrote  to  Necker  to 
beg  him  to  come  to  her:  she  painted  warmly  the  dangers  of  the 
situation,  the  embarrassment  of  the  king,  her  own  grief;  she 
made  an  appeal  to  his  loyalty;  and  Necker,  yielding  without 
great*  difficulty  to  the  eloquence  of  the  queen,  after  he  had  been 
assured  that  he  was  to  be  sole  minister,  accepted  a  position 
which  he  was  at  bottom  not  sorry  to  fill. 

Some  days  after  this,  the  keeper  of  the  seals,  Lamoignon, 
whom  the  public  associated  with  Brienne  in  the  same  maledic- 
tion, retired  in  his  turn. 

The  joy  was  great  and  universal.  Necker,  on  leaving  the 
queen's  apartments,  was  received  with  transports  and  acclama- 
tions; the  galleries  of  the  chateau,  the  courts,  the  streets  of 
Versailles,  resounded  with  the  cries  of,  "Long  live  the  king!" 
"  Long  live  Monsieur  Necker  !  "  The  popularity  of  the  sovereign 
was  revived  by  contact  with  the  popularity  of  the  minister.  With 
Brienne  and  Lamoignon  dismissed,  and  Necker  recalled,  it 
seemed  that  everything  was  saved ;  it  was  more  than  joy,  it 
was  a  delirium.  And  as  the  French  rarely  know  how  to  mani- 
fest their  sentiments  calmly  and  with  measure,  the  scenes  in 
Paris  became  tumultuous.  The  archbishop  and  the  keeper  of 
the  seals  were  burned  in  effigy  at  the  foot  of  the  statue  of  Henri 
IV.  People  who  were  passing  were  arrested ;  women  were  in- 
sulted;  houses  were  pillaged;  blood  was  shed.  Strange  and 


POLITICAL   BROCHURES.  343 

threatening  figures  mingled  with  the  crowd.  It  was  no  longer 
the  explosion  of  the  country's  happiness,  it  was  the  noisy  mani- 
festation of  a  populace  who  knew  its  power  and  showed  it. 

The  queen  laboured  under  no  delusion ;  alone  perhaps  of  those 
about  her,  she  did  not  share  the  general  confidence;  she  was 
agitated  by  gloomy  presentiments.  "  I  tremble,"  she  wrote  sor- 
rowfully, "  that  it  should  be  I  who  have  recalled  him,  —  Necker. 
My  lot  is  to  bear  misfortune ;  and  if  some  infernal  machination 
should  cause  him  to  fail,  or  defeat  the  king's  authority,  they  will 
detest  me  still  more." 

The  queen  was  right.  A  clever  financier,  but  a  mediocre  poli- 
tician, Necker  was  not  equal  to  the  task  he  had  undertaken. 
Would  he  have  succeeded  better  in  dissipating  the  peril  if  he 
had  been  in  power  fifteen  months  earlier?  He  said  so,  and  his 
daughter  wrote  it;  but  it  is  possible  to  doubt  it.  Necker  was, 
perhaps,  a  good  comptroller-general ;  he  was  incapable  of  being 
prime  minister.  He  was  a  financier,  and  not  a  statesman. 
Always  concerned  for  his  popularity,  he  sought  measures  that 
would  please,  rather  than  those  that  might  save.  Without  large 
views,  without  any  fixed  plan  or  precise  idea  of  the  redoubtable 
question  whose  solution  rested  with  him,  he  foresaw  nothing  and 
prevented  nothing.  The  more  the  king  determined  to  yield  up 
his  prerogative,  the  more  important  it  became  that  his  authority 
should  seem  to  be  strong  and  incontestable.  Necker  never  took 
the  initiative,  nor  possessed  that  vigour  of  conception  and  ol 
action  which  allows  of  no  deviation ;  in  place  of  directing  a 
movement,  he  was  content  to  follow  it.  That  physician,  who, 
according  to  Joseph  II.,  was  to  save  France,  had  no  remedy  to 
propose. 

Brienne,  in  the  edict  which  promised  the  convocation  of  the 
States-General,  had  engaged  not  only  the  municipalities  and  the 
tribunals,  but  also  all  philosophers  and  learned  persons,  to  make 
researches,  and  to  give  their  advice  on  the  organization  of  that 
great  Assembly.  Floods  of  brochures  appeared,  setting  forth 
the  ideas  of  any  one  who  could  hold  a  pen,  developing  the  most 
abstract  theories,  and  often  the  strangest  systems,  with  an  abso- 
lute disdain  of  history  and  a  complete  ignorance  of  the  necessities 
of  a  government,  as  if  France  were  a  new  territory,  where  there 
were  no  traditions  and  no  customs  to  be  taken  into  consideration. 
It  was  no  longer  the  liberty,  but  the  license  of  the  Press.  The 
Comte  d'Entraigues,  who  was  to  be  one  of  the  most  ardent 


344  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

agents  of  the  Revolution,  in  his  memoir  on  the  States-General 
attacked  the  monarchy,  glorified  the  republic,  represented  the 
French  as  a  troop  of  slaves,  and  wrote  this  phrase,  which  was  an 
appeal  to  insurrection :  "  There  is  no  sort  of  disorder  which  is 
not  preferable  to  the  fatal  tranquillity  procured  by  absolute 
power."  Sieyes,  in  a  brochure  which  is  still  celebrated,  pro- 
claimed that  the  Third  Estate  was  nothing  in  France,  whereas  it 
should  be  everything,  —  a  bold  sophism,  disproved  by  history, 
for  the  Third  Estate  has  always  played,  and  plays  still,  a  con- 
siderable role ;  but  like  all  sophisms,  condensed  into  a  simple 
and  specious  formula,  it  was  accepted  as  a  revelation  and 
received  as  a  truth. 

Every  question  was  broached ;  all  sorts  of  ideas  started  ;  every 
Utopia  found  an  apostle. 

"  The  fermentation  is  general,"  an  attentive  observer  wrote.  "  One 
hears  nothing  talked  of  but  constitutions ;  the  women,  in  particular,  take 
part  in  the  movement,  and  you  know,  as  I  do,  their  influence  in  this  coun- 
try. It  is  a  veritable  delirium ;  every  one  is  an  administrator,  and  talks 
of  progress.  In  the  antechambers  the  lackeys  are  occupied  in  reading 
the  brochures  which  appear ;  every  day  ten  or  twelve  new  ones  are  pub- 
lished, and  I  do  not  understand  how  there  are  printers  enough.  At  this 
moment  it  is  the  fashionable  question ;  and  you  know  as  well  as  I  the  sway 
of  fashion  here." 

In  the  midst  of  this  wave  which  threatened  to  submerge  every- 
thing, the  good  sense  of  the  public  was  uncertain,  and  needed  a 
guide ;  it  did  not  find  one.  Necker  was  not  less  uncertain  and 
adrift  than  the  public.  Twenty  problems  presented  themselves 
which  demanded  a  prompt  and  decisive  solution.  The  States- 
General  were  to  be  assembled,  that  was  a  fixed  fact.  But  where 
should  they  assemble?  What  should  be  their  composition? 
What  questions  should  be  submitted  to  them?  What  rights 
should  they  have?  What  should  be  the  duration  of  the  session? 
Could  one  rely  in  such  serious  questions  on  writers  without  a 
mission,  and  on  legislators  without  experience?  Was  not  the  first 
duty  of  the  minister  to  examine  the  situation  carefully  and  calmly 
himself;  to  surround  himself  with  enlightened  counsellors;  to 
listen  to  the  wishes  of  the  public  without  allowing  himself  to  be 
carried  away  by  its  wild  impatience  ;  to  have  a  conviction  himself 
on  each  point  in  dispute,  and  having  once  formed  that  conviction, 
to  make  an  energetic  and  irrevocable  decision,  —  in  a  word,  to  have 


VARIOUS    PLANS.  345 


a  determined  goal,  and  to  march  toward  it  with  a  firm  step? 
Necker  was  not  equal  to  it.  During  the  whole  of  the  latter 
part  of  the  year  1788,  he  allowed  the  discussion  to  be  continued, 
minds  to  become  agitated,  and  opinion  to  become  inflamed. 
Then,  not  knowing  what  to  do  in  the  midst  of  so  much  contradic- 
tory advice,  he  had  the  strange  idea  after  the  recent  sad  experi- 
ence of  recalling  the  Notables  to  submit  to  them  all  these  questions. 
This  was  to  avow  that  he  had  no  plans  himself,  and  what  was 
worse,  no  will.  As  before,  the  Notables  separated  after  having 
only  augmented  the  confusion. 

It  was  necessary,  however,  to  adopt  some  course ;  and  the  first 
point  to  decide  was  the  city  wherein  the  Assembly  of  the  States- 
General  should  take  place.  Necker  proposed  Paris,  or  Versailles, 
which  offered  an  equal  number  of  disadvantages  with  Paris ;  the 
queen  desired  a  city  forty  or  fifty  leagues  from  the  capital,  — 
Orleans,  or  Tours,  or  even  Rheims,  Lyons,  or  Bordeaux.  She 
realized  how  necessary  it  was  that  for  such  an  assembly  to  pre- 
serve its  liberty,  it  should  be  separated  from  a  centre  of  agita- 
tion and  revolution  like  Paris,  which  was  always  ready  for  a  riot, 
always  disposed  to  impose  its  will  by  means  of  a  numerous  mob, 
and  by  reason  of  this  numerous  mob,  easy  to  influence.  But 
Necker  represented  the  expenditure  which  the  displacement  of 
the  court  would  necessitate;  his  opinion  prevailed.  The  king, 
in  order  to  be  nearer  the  States-General,  decided  that  they  should 
meet  at  Versailles. 

But  a  more  serious  question,  and  one  which  had  more  passion- 
ately aroused  public  opinion,  presented  itself.  This  was  the  rep- 
resentation of  the  Third  Estate.  Should  this  representation  be 
double  that  of  the  other  two  orders?  When  Parliament  had  regis- 
tered the  edict  of  the  convocation  of  the  States-General,  it  had 
added  the  clause  that  they  should  be  held  with  all  the  forms  used 
in  1614;  but  many  changes  had  occurred  since  1614.  The  impor- 
tance of  the  first  two  orders  had  diminished ;  while  that  of  the  third, 
on  the  other  hand,  had  greatly  increased.  In  the  provincial  as- 
semblies, the  number  of  deputies  from  the  Third  Estate  equalled 
the  number  of  deputies  from  the  clergy  and  the  noblesse  combined. 
The  greater  number  of  the  publicists  demanded  that  the  same 
rule  should  apply  to  the  States-General  as  to  the  provincial  as- 
semblies; and  the  declaration  of  Parliament  immediately  lessened 
the  popularity  of  that  great  body,  which  had  hitherto  been  valued 
for  its  resistance,  often  factious,  to  the  royal  authority.  It  was 


346  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

on  Dec.  27,  1788,  that  the  government  pronounced  its  opinion. 
Marie  Antoinette  was  present  at  the  council;  the  double  repre- 
sentation of  the  Third  Estate  was  agreed  upon.  The  king  from 
a  feeling  of  justice,  the  queen  from  the  same  sentiment  and 
also  from  distrust  of  the  first  two  orders,  whose  opposition  had 
more  than  once  created  such  great  embarrassment  in  the  govern- 
ment during  the  last  two  years,  and  Necker  from  his  love  of  popu- 
larity, had  agreed  upon  this  decision ;  but  Necker  assumed  all 
the  credit  of  it.  By  a  strange  neglect  of  decorum,  an  act  of  this 
importance  was  published  without  preamble ;  it  only  said  that 
the  king,  after  having  studied  the  report  of  his  minister  of  finance, 
had  adopted  the  principle.  Thus  Necker  had,  in  the  eyes  of  the 
public,  all  the  merit  and  all  the  credit  of  this  popular  measure; 
the  monarch  was  thrown  into  the  shade,  in  order  to  heighten  the 
brilliancy  of  the  all-powerful  minister,  —  a  singular  manner  of  ele- 
vating the  majesty  and  authority  of  the  throne  in  the  eyes  of  the 
populace.  But  Necker  only  listened  to  his  own  extreme  vanity, 
which  veiled  his  real  insufficiency  before  his  own  eyes  and  the 
eyes  of  the  masses.  According  to  the  saying  of  one  of  the  histo- 
rians who  has  shown  the  greatest  impartiality  in  judging  the  con- 
duct of  the  Genevan  financier  at  this  time,  "  He  played  the  role 
of  king  because  he  was  impotent  to  fulfil  the  part  of  minister." 

Another  decision  of  cardinal  importance  —  that  of  the  vote  by 
order  or  by  head  —  was  left  to  the  decision  of  the  States,  who 
thus  were  charged,  by  a  fatal  mistake  or  blind  lack  of  foresight, 
with  the  making  of  their  own  rules  and  the  direction  of  their 
own  work. 

The  noblesse  were  indignant  with  the  queen  for  the  part  she 
had  taken  in  this  affair.  It  was  her  destiny  to  be  held  respon- 
sible for  everything.  The  princes  of  the  blood  sent  to  the  king 
by  the  Comte  d'Artois  a  protest  against  this  increase  of  the  Third 
Estate ;  and  the  prince  made  the  most  lively  representations  to 
his  sister-in-law  concerning  her  preference  for  the  Third  Estate, 
and  on  the  necessity  of  upholding  the  noblesse.  The  queen 
listened  to  him  without  interruption,  but  her  sentiments  were  not 
changed.  This  was  the  signal  between  Marie  Antoinette  and  her 
brother-in-law  for  an  estrangement  which  had  been  preparing  for 
some  time,  and  which  the  years  that  followed  but  increased. 
The  Polignacs  took  sides  with  the  Comte  d'Artois,  and  the  bonds 
of  friendship,  already  greatly  relaxed,  threatened  to  break,  as 
well  as  family  ties. 


Comte  d'Artois  ami  Comte  de  Provence. 


DE  PROVENCE  COVERTLY  ATTACKS  HER.    347 

Alas !  it  was  not  long  before  the  unfortunate  woman  found 
only  enemies  in  the  royal  family,  and  the  most  implacable  were 
those  on  the  very  steps  of  the  throne.  Of  a  cold  and  calculating 
disposition,  the  Comte  de  Provence  had  always  been  looked  upon 
with  suspicion  by  Marie  Antoinette.  On  several  occasions  he 
had  sought  to  draw  near  her  from  policy.  He  had  given  her  a 
magnificent  entertainment  in  his  house  of  Brunoy,  with  the  most 
ingenious  and  gallant  diversions ;  he  had  accompanied  her  to  the 
balls  at  the  opera ;  he  had  even  gone  so  far  as  to  write  verses  in 
her  honour;  and  one  day,  having  broken  a  fan  of  which  the 
queen  was  very  fond,  he  had  hastened  to  send  her  another  with 
this  quatrain :  — 

"In  the  midst  of  a  heat  one  can  scarcely  support 

For  your  comfort  I  seek  to  provide. 
My  care  is  the  Zephyrs  to  call  to  your  side ; 
The  Loves  of  themselves  come  unsought." 

But  this  intimacy  was  only  apparent,  and  on  the  part  of  Mon- 
sieur entirely  the  result  of  calculation.  Ambitious  and  eager  to 
play  a  role,  clever  and  distinguished,  feeling  himself,  moreover, 
the  superior  of  Louis  XVI.,  he  regarded  it  as  a  mistake,  and 
almost  as  an  insult  on  the  part  of  Nature,  that  he  should  not  have 
been  the  first-born.  "  His  grief,"  the  queen  wrote,  "  all  his  life, 
has  been  not  to  be  master."  During  the  journeys  that  he  had 
made  to  the  centre  of  France  in  1787,  he  had  exhibited  an 
almost  royal  magnificence  and  equipage,  posing  almost  as  a 
pretender,  as  if  seeking  to  eclipse  the  king  and  to  attract  to 
himself,  to  the  detriment  of  the  sovereign,  the  regards  and  affec- 
tions of  the  people.  "  If  Monsieur  de  Maurepas  were  not  such  a 
softling,"  Joseph  II.  said  energetically,  "  one  could  not  conceive 
how  he  could  allow  such  things."  The  power  of  the  queen  had 
overthrown  her  brother-in-law.  He  accused  her  of  having  hin- 
dered him  from  entering  the  council,  and  could  not  pardon  her 
for  it.  He  could  pardon  her  still  less  for  her  tardy  maternity, 
which  had  closed  to  him  the  prospect  of  the  throne  at  the  very 
moment  when  he  was  beginning  to  believe  it  assured  to  him. 
Publicly,  and  before  her,  he  made  the  best  of  it;  but  behind 
her  back,  and  in  secret,  he  tore  her  to  pieces.  Criticisms,  per- 
siflage, epigrams,  calumnies,  libels,  petty  verses  and  broc/mres, — 
he  spared  nothing;  and  his  palace,  the  Luxembourg,  exempt 
by  its  privileges  from  all  police  researches,  became  the  store- 
house of  the  libels  and  pamphlets  which  flooded  Versailles 


348  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

and  Paris.  In  the  conflicts  of  the  minister  and  Parliament,  the 
prince  had  openly  declared  for  Parliament,  seeking  to  found  his 
reputation  for  liberalism  in  opposition  to  the  court  and  at  the 
expense  of  the  authority  of  the  king,  and  to  crush  by  his  popu- 
larity the  unpopularity  of  his  sister-in-law  and  the  nonentity  of 
his  brother.  The  statesman  in  him  was  still  only  in  embryo ; 
the  hard  experience  of  exile  was  necessary  to  mature  it. 

Designing  like  her  husband,  Italian  in  both  mind  and  body, 
of  mediocre  intelligence,  of  a  deceitful  and  reserved  character, 
Madame  had  no  more  sympathy  for  the  queen  than  Monsieur. 
The  two  sisters-in-law  had  at  first  lived  together  frankly  but 
coldly,  without  quarrels,  without  confidence;  but  soon  distrust 
had  intervened.  There  was  no  open  rupture,  but  only  secret 
hostility.  Without  influence  at  court,  possessing  none  over  her 
husband,  who  deserted  her  for  Madame  de  Baldi,  looked  upon 
with  disfavour  by  the  king,  little  loved  by  those  about  her,  often 
exhibiting  a  want  of  tact,  living  apart  and  concerning  herself 
almost  exclusively  with  her  farm  and  her  kitchen,  Madame  was 
not  a  redoubtable  enemy  for  the  queen ;  but  she  made  a  voice 
the  more  in  the  concert  of  recriminations  and  malevolent  rancour 
raised  against  her. 

The  Comte  d'Artois,  who  was  gay,  lively,  well  made,  and  fond 
of  pleasure,  was  for  a  long  time  one  of  Marie  Antoinette's  inti- 
mates. He  was  the  organizer  of  her  diversions,  the  habitual  host 
at  Trianon,  the  favourite  of  the  Polignac  set.  In  this  role  he  was 
one  of  those  on  whom  history  has  laid  the  greatest  responsibility 
for  the  dissipation  and  frivolity  which  for  a  time  carried  away  the 
queen.  The  races,  the  play,  the  balls,  all  those  entertainments 
which  we  have  mentioned  above,  originated  with  the  Comte  d'Ar- 
tois. This  community  of  amusements  had  not  a  little  contrib- 
uted toward  drawing  upon  the  young  sovereign  (who,  however, 
had  but  a  mediocre  liking  for  her  brother-in-law)  a  share  of  the 
unpopularity  of  that  prince,  who  was  undoubtedly  amiable,  but 
who  was  petulant,  haughty,  prodigal,  and  contemptuous  of  the 
opinion  of  the  public.  Age,  reflection,  experience,  and  the  purer 
joys  and  more  austere  cares  of  maternity  had  diminished  an 
intimacy  which  only  rested  in  reality  upon  a  need  of  distrac- 
tion and  the  fear  of  being  bored.  The  opposition  which  the 
Comte  d'Artois  had  shown  to  Necker's  reforms,  the  support 
which  he  had  given  to  Calonne,  the  part  which  he  had  taken  in 
the  fall  of  Brienne,  the  memoir  which  he  had  handed  to  the 


MADAME    ELISABETH.  349 

king  concerning  the  increase  of  the  Third  Estate,  succeeded  in 
estranging  him  completely  from  his  sister-in-law.  The  thirst  of 
pleasure  had  for  a  moment  united  them ;  the  cares  of  more  seri- 
ous occupations  separated  them;  politics  divided  them,  and  was 
to  divide  them  still  further. 

Of  the  Comtesse  d'Artois,  who  was  good  and  sweet,  but  an 
absolute  nonentity,  we  have  nothing  to  say.  No  one  paid  any 
attention  to  her  at  court,  and  her  husband  least  of  all.  In  the 
beginning,  her  repeated  pregnancy,  in  face  of  the  sterility  of  the 
queen  and  Madame,  had  given  her  a  certain  importance.  The 
birth  of  the  dauphin  had  thrown  her  into  obscurity  again.  "  It 
would  be  necessary  for  that  poor  little  princess  to  die  in  order  to 
make  any  one  think  of  her,"  Madame  de  Bombelles  wrote  at  a 
time  when  the  countess  was  very  ill  of  a  malignant  fever.  Such 
was  the  opinion  of  the  court,  and  that  of  the  public ;  and  if  the 
princess  had  then  died,  such  would  probably  have  been  her 
funeral  oration. 

The  only  one  of  her  sisters-in-law  for  whom  Marie  Antoinette 
felt  any  real  sympathy  was  Madame  Elisabeth.  She  had  soon 
learned  to  value  that  young  girl,  whose  gay  spirit,  decided  char- 
acter, naive  grace,  and  exquisite  sensibility  touched  her.  "  I 
fear,"  she  wrote  to  her  mother,  "  to  grow  too  fond  of  her."  The 
years  had  only  made  this  attraction  stronger ;  and  the  almost  in- 
stinctive affection  which  a  lovable  child  inspires  had  given  place 
to  the  more  serious  affection  which  springs  from  an  esteem  for 
solid  and  profound  qualities.  The  young  princess's  taste  for  a 
tranquil  life  and  for  friendship,  her  repugnance  to  pomp  and 
pretension,  had  perhaps  also  contributed  to  increase  the  friend- 
ship of  the  queen,  who  shared  these  inclinations  and  repugnances. 
When  Marie  Antoinette  went  to  Trianon,  she  always  took  her 
young  sister-in-law  with  her,  and  there  surrounded  her  with  the 
most  delicate  attentions,  prepared  the  most  charming  surprises 
for  her,  associated  her  in  her  pleasures,  made  her  play  a  r61e  in 
the  "Gageure  Imprevue,"  took  her  to  St.  Cyr,  to  Rambouillet,  to 
La  Muette,  to  Bellevue,  to  St.  Cloud,  to  the  hunt,  to  the  play, 
gave  her  even  a  larger  share  in  her  distress  and  disquietude,  and 
implored  her  aid  in  caring  for  her  sick  children.  During  a  time, 
notably  in  1781,  one  would  have  said  that  the  two  sisters-in-law 
were  inseparable.  The  queen  had  wished  that  Madame  Elisabeth 
should  also  have  her  own  house.  She  had  induced  the  king  to  buy 
the  house  of  the  Prince  de  Gueme'n^e  at  Montreuil;  and  one  day, 


350  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

without  saying  anything,  she  conducted  her  young  sister-in-law 
thither.  "  You  are  in  your  own  home,"  she  said  to  her;  "  this  is 
to  be  your  Trianon.  The  king,  who  takes  pleasure  in  presenting 
it.  to  you,  has  allowed  me  the  pleasure  of  apprising  you  of  it." 

What  is  strange,  however,  is  that  this  affection  was  not  recip- 
rocal ;  where  the  queen  yielded  herself  entirely,  Madame  Elisa- 
beth preserved  a  certain  reserve,  which  resembled  mistrust,  and 
in  a  letter  which  she  wrote  at  that  time,  allowed  herself  to  say, 
"  Our  opinions  differ;  she  is  an  Austrian,  and  I  am  a  Bourbon." 
The  school  of  misfortune  was  needed  to  open  her  eyes,  and  show 
the  queen  to  her  in  her  true  light.  She  understood  then  the 
queen's  real  worth,  and  reproached  herself  for  having  misjudged 
her  for  a  time ;  the  hesitating  friend  of  Trianon  became  the 
devoted  companion  of  the  Temple. 

An  Austrian !  This  word  alone  reveals  the  instigator  of  the 
prejudices  which  for  a  time  estranged  the  affection  of  Madame 
Elisabeth  from  the  queen.  Between  the  two  sisters-in-law,  so  well 
formed  to  understand  each  other,  the  fatal  influence  of  Madame 
Adelaide  had  risen  like  a  malevolent  fairy.  During  the  last 
hours  of  the  monarchy,  as  at  the  beginning  of  the  reign,  the 
old  princess  preserved  against  the  queen,  already  so  unfortunate, 
the  obstinate  dislike  with  which  she  had  hounded  her  as  dauphin- 
ess  and  as  the  adored  sovereign.  In  her  retirement  at  Bellevue, 
whence  she  rarely  departed,  embittered  by  age  and  by  her  iso- 
lation, she  gathered  with  malevolent  joy  all  the  insinuations 
against  Marie  Antoinette,  —  the  pamphlets,  the  satires,  the  com- 
plots,  the  equivocal  anecdotes,  which  those  who  wished  to  pay 
their  court  to  her  hastened  to  bring  her.  Champcenetz  and  the 
Marquis  de  Louvois  were  the  usual  purveyors  of  this  honest 
coterie;  and  thence  pamphlets,  songs,  anecdotes,  reviewed,  cor- 
rected, and  annotated,  were  sent  forth  to  amuse  the  court,  to 
scandalize  the  city,  to  embitter  public  opinion,  and  if  possible, 
to  prejudice  the  king  against  his  wife.  Madame  Adelaide  had 
even  dared  one  day,  on  July  12,  1788,  to  go  to  her  nephew  and 
lay  before  him  with  acrimonious  passion  her  grievances  against 
the  queen;  the  attack  had  failed,  despite  the  support  which, 
from  her  retreat  at  St.  Denys,  Madame  Louise  had  lent  it;  and 
the  king  had  dryly  begged  his  aunt  not  to  quit  Bellevue  again. 
But  we  can  imagine  that  this  check  had  not  appeased  the  ran- 
cour of  the  old  maid ;  during  the  end  of  the  reign,  Bellevue, 
which  Madame  owed  to  a  delicate  attention  on  the  part  of  her 


THE    DUG   D'ORLfiANS.  351 

niece,  became  the  scene  of  all  the  intrigues  against  Marie 
Antoinette. 

It  was  to  Bellevue  that  the  Prince  de  Cond6  went  to  receive 
new  inspiration  before  accompanying  Madame  Adelaide  when 
she  went  to  denounce  the  queen  to  her  husband.  It  was  to 
Bellevue  again  that  he  went  to  revive  his  hatred  against  the 
young  sovereign.  A  valiant  warrior,  prodigal  by  taste  and  by 
the  tradition  of  his  race,  but  of  a  narrow  mind  and  violent  char- 
acter, a  sufficiently  bad  head  of  the  family,  moreover,  the  Prince 
de  Conde  was  immoderate  in  everything  he  did,  in  his  passions 
as  in  his  rancour.  Blindly  attached  to  the  ancient  French  policy, 
he  could  not  pardon  Marie  Antoinette  her  Austrian  origin.  He 
pardoned  her  still  less  for  opposing  the  person  whom  he  had 
named  as  chief  master  of  the  artillery,  and  for  having  refused  to 
allow  Madame  de  Monaco,  his  friend,  to  appear  before  her, 
declaring  that  she  would  not  receive  women  who  were  separated 
from  their  husbands.  The  trial  of  the  Cardinal  de  Rohan  had 
added  another  pretext  to  his  complaints ;  and  from  that  time  the 
prince  had  ranged  himself  among  the  most  inveterate  enemies 
of  the  queen. 

His  son,  the  Due  de  Bourbon,  had  no  personal  grievance  against 
Marie  Antoinette.  In  the  affair  which  made  so  much  noise —  his 
duel  with  the  Comte  d'Artois  —  the  queen  had  shown  no  prefer- 
ence ;  but  the  lover  of  fifteen  years,  who  was  so  soon  disloyal, 
forgot  his  incessant  quarrels  with  his  father,  in  order  to  share  his 
prejudices. 

Despised  at  court,  despised  by  the  public,  the  brother-in-law  of 
the  Due  de  Bourbon,  the  Due  d'Orleans,  had  only  been  able  to  re- 
gain a  little  favour  by  declaring  himself  the  queen's  enemy.  What 
had  led  him  to  do  this?  Was  it  disappointed  ambition,  wounded 
vanity,  dreams  of  illegitimate  grandeur?  A  little  of  all  these, 
perhaps.  He  has  been  represented  as  a  persevering  and  clever 
conspirator,  pushing  his  way  to  the  throne  by  shady  machina- 
tions ;  but  this  is  an  error.  Of  a  noble  bearing  and  distinguished 
air,  preserving  in  the  midst  of  his  gross  irregularities  an  attractive 
manner  and  elegant  dress,  but  light-minded,  of  a  weak  character, 
incapable  of  sustained  attention  to  anything  serious,  idle  and  indo- 
lent to  excess,  the  Due  d'Orleans  had  no  quality  that  could  make 
him  the  chief  of  a  party.  His  dissolute  life,  which  was  but  too  evi- 
dent in  his  face,  his  infidelity  to  his  wife, —  the  pious  daughter  of 
the  Due  de  Penthievre,  —  his  orgies  at  Monceaux,  his  cynical 


352  LIFE    OF    MARIE    ANTOINETTE. 

tone,  destroyed  all  his  influence  ;  but  his  title  as  first  prince  of  the 
blood  and  his  immense  fortune  made  him  a  dangerous  instrument 
in  the  hands  of  clever  intriguers.  While  he  was  still  only  Due  de 
Chartres,  he  had  begun  by  paying  court  to  the  queen ;  he  had 
given  her  balls  at  the  Palais  Royal,  organized  with  the  Comte 
d'Artois,  then  his  companion  in  pleasure,  horse-races  in  her  honour, 
frequented  sedulously  the  salon  of  his  sister-in-law,  the  Princesse 
de  Lamballe,  the  queen's  favourite.  The  latter  at  that  epoch 
showed  her  young  cousin  marked  favour:  she  obtained  for  him 
the  government  of  Poitou ;  two  years  later  she  had  him  made 
colonel-general  of  hussars, -and  had  even  exhibited  in  the  pur- 
suit of  this  nomination  such  warmth  as  to  displease  the  public, 
which  was  at  that  time  strongly  indisposed  toward  the  prince. 

This  appointment  was  made  shortly  after  the  battle  of  Oues- 
sant.  The  conduct  of  the  Due  de  Chartres  in  that  affair  had 
given  rise  to  lively  recriminations,  and  even  to  dishonourable 
suspicions ;  to-day,  when  we  can  better  judge  of  this  affair, 
because  of  our  greater  knowledge  and  freedom  from  passion, 
it  is  certain  that  if  the  bravery  of  the  prince  cannot  be  called  in 
question,  his  capacity  as  a  sailor  cannot  be  established.  The 
queen  had  sought  in  this  appointment  an  honourable  means  of 
retiring  him  from  the  marine ;  but  this  was  not  what  the  duke 
desired,  as  he  had  aspired  to  the  position  of  chief  admiral.  Dis- 
satisfied with  the  new  title  given  to  him,  wounded  in  his  privileges 
as  prince  of  the  blood  during  the  journey  of  the  Archduke  Maxi- 
milian, he  withdrew  from  the  court,  and  from  that  time  joined 
the  cabal  hostile  to  the  queen.  Did  the  latter  avenge  herself  for 
his  ill-justified  susceptibility  by  repeating  some  of  the  cutting 
pleasantries  to  which  the  behaviour  of  the  commander  of  the 
Blue  Squadron  had  given  rise?  The  chroniclers  of  the  time 
aver  it,  and  it  does  not  seem  improbable. 

Despite  her  extreme  good-nature,  Marie  Antoinette  could  not 
always  resist  the  temptation  of  listening  to  or  saying  something 
witty.  There  arose  consequently  a  war  of  underhand  intrigues 
and  perfidious  machinations  on  the  part  of  the  prince,  of  piquant 
raillery  on  the  part  of  the  queen,  —  a  war  seemingly  inoffensive 
in  the  beginning  (for  what  danger  was  there  to  fear  from  a 
man  whose  morals  all  Paris  decried,  and  whose  military  exploits 
and  industrial  enterprises  the  court  made  sport  of?),  — until  the 
day  when  the  prince,  piqued  by  a  remark  that  his  instincts  were 
mercantile  rather  than  princely,  irritated  at  the  failure  of  the  mar- 


THE    CONDITION    OF    FRANCE.  353 

riage  he  had  planned  between  his  son  and  Madame  Royale,  and 
instigated,  furthermore,  by  the  worthy  companions  of  his  pleasure 
(the  Laclos,  the  Lauzuns,  the  Sillerys),  burst  forth  suddenly  in 
full  Parliament  on  Nov.  19,  1787,  while  the  king  was  holding  a  sol- 
emn session,  to  demand  the  registration  of  a  loan  of  four  hundred 
and  twenty  millions,  with,  "  This  registration  is  illegal."  This  vio- 
lent outbreak  brought  upon  him  the  king's  displeasure,  who  was  the 
more  justly  incensed  as  he  had  just  accorded  him  a  much-desired 
permission,  but  gained  for  him  as  compensation  the  favour  of  the 
public —  which  was  at  first  surprised  at  this  vigorous  measure  — 
and  the  good-will  of  Madame  Adelaide.  This  prudish  and  pious 
princess  openly  took  sides  with  the  libertine  prince,  who  put  at 
the  service  of  the  rancour  of  the  old  maid  the  name  of  D'Orleans 
and  the  fortune  of  the  Penthievres. 

Exiled  to  Villers-Cotteret,  the  duke  did  not  sustain  with  much 
constancy  his  role  as  chief  of  the  party;  he  had  neither  sufficient 
audacity  nor  courage  for  it.  At  the  end  of  a  few  months,  weary  of 
his  exile,  regretting  the  pleasures  of  Monceaux,  and  eager  to  see 
Madame  Buffon  again,  he  solicited  the  queen  for  permission  to 
return  to  Paris,  or  at  least  to  reside  nearer  to  it.  At  that  moment, 
when  the  circumstances  were  so  solemn,  Marie  Antoinette,  who 
was  ever  disposed  to  clemency,  listened  to  Madame  de  Lamballe, 
and  despite  her  repugnance,  yielded  to  the  wishes  of  her  friend. 
The  duke  was  allowed  to  repair  to  his  chateau  of  Raincy,  and  thus 
added  to  his  former  grievances  against  Marie  Antoinette  a  griev- 
ance the  more,  —  that  of  gratitude.  The  opposition  to  the  court 
and  the  enemies  of  the  queen  had  for  the  future  a  nominal  chief, 
and  this  chief  was  the  first  prince  of  the  blood. 

A  royal  family  divided  against  itself;  a  king  who  was  anxious 
for  the  good  of  his  people,  but  who  was  weak,  undecided,  dis- 
couraged ;  a  queen  who  was  valiant,  but  lacking  in  experience, 
and  the  object  of  popular  hatred ;  a  self-sufficient  minister,  with- 
out plan  or  direction ;  a  feverish  public  opinion  which  was  as 
dangerous  by  reason  of  its  ill-considered  hopes  as  its  unjust  sus- 
picions;  an  exhausted  treasury;  a  malevolent  capital;  the  coun- 
try scarce  recovered  from  its  recent  disturbances ;  an  army  in 
which  the  seeds  of  disorganization  were  already  sown ;  every- 
where means  of  attack,  nowhere  any  means  of  defence ;  and  as  if 
Nature  herself  conspired  with  men  to  destroy  the  old  monarchical 
edifice,  a  terrible  winter  following  a  bad  summer;  the  rivers 
frozen,  the  roads  blocked  with  snow,  rendering  it  difficult  to 
VOL.  i. —  23 


354  LIFE   OF   MARIE   ANTOINETTE. 

provision  Paris;  the  water-mills  unable  to  run,  and  thus  stopping 
the  grinding  of  grain ;  the  scarcity  adding  real  suffering  to  the 
vague  disquietude ;  famine  furnishing  astonishing  facility  for  every 
intrigue,  and  specious  pretexts  for  indignation,  —  it  was  under  such 
circumstances  and  with  such  guides  that  France  approached  the 
most  formidable  crisis  that  she  had  ever  met  in  her  history. 


END   OF  VOL.  L 


